Steve Ersinghaus

One of my hobbies is studying how the design of spaces–landscape, architectural, digital–shape experience and encourage problem solving, creativity, and interaction. So it was fun to finally experience the Stata Center. A few photos from the trip on Friday:
The Stata Center for Computer, Information and Intelligence Sciences is built on the site of MIT’s legendary [...]

I’m an advocate of open borders. I’d like to see gates and walls come down and any plan to maintain and build structures along the US Mexico border cease. This is, of course, a position of hypothesis that asks: what would happen if border gates, walls, and barriers were removed? And why would a particular [...]

Emily Gertz has this to say about future investment in clean tech, which bring back to mind Connecticut’s plans for the future.
Are clean technologies the investment opportunity of the 21st century? That was the breathless question at the panel I went to on Thursday, the second day of the “Advancing Sustainable Prosperity” conference in Boston. [...]

I caught Ira Glass on television last night. This American Life is an amazing radio program. I was a little leery of the visual version but was pleasantly surprised. TAL is an amazing offering. There’s nothing like it either on the radio or on television. Why, because even the modern pig farmer is trapped.

“The last thing we need is more tax increases,” said House GOP leader Lawrence Cafero of Norwalk. “We have a realistic, responsible budget. I didn’t want to stand up here and talk just in terms of charts, rhetoric and one-liners.”
This sort of statement is pretty point blank. It sounds good. But it’s meaningless. We can [...]

A couple of depressing items in the paper this morning, both having to do with hypertexuality. The first has to do with I-84 in Connecticut and the corruption of road building. The FHA will be withholding 5m in highway aid until CT comes up with a plan to fix whatever problem needs fixing near Waterbury. [...]

Spazeboy writes further about his Tour de Tunxis.
I’d like to see him write more about a logical full-time faculty staffing number. I think we need five more English faculty to cover work load. That’s a lot of faculty. What forces prohibit a reasonable number of full-time teaching faculty?
Is this the correct question?
He might ask, “Why [...]

Jesse Ives adds to a post with this comment
The “Game” of life is a serious one, and goals can be important. Of course that’s one of the problems people are facing; a lack of goals. I’m guilty of it myself, but that’s neither here nor there. If a person chooses a path often they can’t [...]

Believe it or not, this actually does help.
As does this and this.

On E8 and symmetry
At the most basic level, the E8 calculation is an investigation of symmetry. Mathematicians invented the Lie groups to capture the essence of symmetry: underlying any symmetrical object, such as a sphere, is a Lie group.
Lie groups come in families. The classical groups A1, A2, A3, … B1, B2, B3, … C1, [...]

Every time GWBush adds to the subject of schools. a whole host of writing follows, which basically cover all the same ground. Public school quality, choice, NCLB, alternatives. As I’ve said before, states can create all the choices they want for students and families but none of these will solve a core problem: the spaces [...]

I want to thank everyone for their wonderful help and offers of aide and support. I hope I deserve it and have the opportunity to help anyone who needs it in the future.
There’s lots more to be said about family and friends.
At the moment I feel a bit like a rodeo clown at the sharp [...]

A few weeks back I found a fairly large lump in my abdomen. It was soft, flexible and stayed in my mind for a few moments before something else grabbed my attention. I’d been doing lots of work on the basement walls and building and installing some understair shelving for storage and as a fort [...]

Susan Gibb sends this link to if:Book’s snip of Linden Lab’s announcement opening its Second Life’s code to the public. Exciting stuff.

From Verlyn Klinkenborg
Nearly every image of nature I have ever come across misses the sense of intricate confusion underfoot in the woods, the thickets of goldenrod collapsing into each other along the roadsides, the rotting tusks of fallen beeches broken against the western hillside. It almost never makes sense to talk about the purpose of [...]