Angus' Hateful 8 review

I really enjoyed the film.  Never got bored, looked at my watch, checked my phone, nothing.

To me this was at heart a comedy. I found it quite funny. Laugh out loud funny. The violence is cartoonish.

To be a bit more specific, it is kind of two different buddy comedies mashed into one. The first part is Bob Hope and Bing Crosby in "The Road to Red Rock". The second part is "I love you man" as directed by Herschel Gordon Lewis.

Damien Bichir and Jennifer Jason Leigh are hilarious and excellent.  Walton Goggins turns Boyd Crowder up a notch and to me is the star of the film.

If you squint real hard, the film also speaks about the possibility of better race relations, especially in the South.

I enjoyed it more than Django Unchained.

Oklahoma gettin' smarter, North Carolina gettin' dumber

Cool graph from a group called City Report showing how young educated people are flowing into selected urban areas.

Here the increase in young people with BAs or better in on the vertical axis and the increase in total population is on the horizontal:

As you can see OKC has the second largest increase in young educated people and that increase is large given its overall population growth. Charlotte NC and Raleigh NC are getting relatively dumber as their overall population is growing faster than their young and educated population (Atlanta and Dallas too!).

Interestingly New Orleans, Buffalo and Pittsburgh are losing overall population while gaining a decent amount of young and educated people, while Detroit and Cleveland are stinking in both dimensions.

I guess all those Mungowitz-educated  Duke students are not staying in NC!

Hat-tip to The Upshot!

Indie Truth Bombs

“Hear ye, Hear ye! We suck.”

More internet greatness here.

Hook Up

A Cross-Cultural Content-Analytic Comparison of the Hookup Culture in U.S. and Dutch Teen Girl Magazines 

Suchi Pradyumn Joshi, Jochen Peter & Patti Valkenburg
Journal of Sex Research, forthcoming

Abstract: This quantitative content analysis investigated the hookup culture in U.S. and Dutch teen girl magazines. Using Hofstede's cultural dimension of masculinity/femininity, the hookup culture (i.e., the relational context of sex, emotional context of sex, specific sexual activities, and contraceptives) was examined in 2,496 stories from all 2006 through 2008 issues of the three most popular U.S. (i.e., Seventeen, CosmoGirl! U.S. edition, and Teen) and Dutch teen girl magazines (i.e., Fancy, CosmoGirl! Netherlands edition, and Girlz!). Regarding the relational context of sex, stories about casual sex occurred more often in U.S. magazines, and Dutch magazines focused more on committed sex. Dutch magazines also emphasized sex within the emotional context of love more often than did U.S. magazines. In terms of sexual activities, coital sex was mentioned more often in U.S. coverage, while petting was mentioned more frequently in Dutch coverage. Condoms were covered more positively in U.S. magazines than in Dutch magazines. Overall, the hookup culture seems to be more visible in U.S. magazines for the occurrence of casual sex and lack of love stories, whereas it does not emerge in Dutch magazines due to the presence of committed sex and love-related articles.

Nod to Kevin Lewis

The End of History Illusion

The End of History Illusion

Jordi Quoidbach, Daniel Gilbert & Timothy Wilson
Science, 4 January 2013, Pages 96-98

Abstract:
We measured the personalities, values, and preferences of more than 19,000 people who ranged in age from 18 to 68 and asked them to report how much they had changed in the past decade and/or to predict how much they would change in the next decade. Young people, middle-aged people, and older people all believed they had changed a lot in the past but would change relatively little in the future. People, it seems, regard the present as a watershed moment at which they have finally become the person they will be for the rest of their lives. This "end of history illusion" had practical consequences, leading people to overpay for future opportunities to indulge their current preferences.

Nod to Kevin Lewis

"What was that idiot thinking?" ~ future me about present me

Great article about problems with end of life directives. Turns out that our present selves are not very good about predicting what our future selves will want.

Money quote:

“Despite the prodigious effort devoted to designing, legislating, and studying of advance directives, the consensus of medical ethicists, researchers in health care services, and palliative care physicians is that the directives have been a resounding failure.”

The article reminded me of the excellent book, "Stumbling On Happiness".