I mentioned earlier my feeling that the hack of the Ashley Madison website and the dumping of all the information about its subscribers was not a good thing. These were the private activities of private people and there was no discernible public interest served by releasing this information. Unfortunately, people seem to have created new sites to help people use the database to make it easier to find people according to where they live.
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The Northeast Ohio Chapter of the Center for Inquiry holds its biennial Humanism Banquet on Friday, October 2, 2015 from 7:00-10:00 pm at the Crowne Plaza Hotel in the Cleveland suburb of Independence. The guest speaker will be Vyckie Garrison who was once part of the Quiverfull Movement, a Christian fundamentalist group that shuns contraception and believes that it is god who opens and shuts a woman’s womb, which must keep him/her/it pretty busy. The movement encourages families to have vast numbers of children in order to create an army for god and they believe that god would not let families have more children than they can handle.
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Take a look at this logo that was designed for an outfit that was providing jazz dance classes for young people. Notice anything?

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Michael Wilson has a fascinating article in which he examines the transcripts of psychics testifying before the parole boards where they come clean and admit that they are running scams. What was interesting in the article is that it seems like there is no shortage of people willing to give them huge sums of money. He cites the case of Celia Mitchell.
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Via Jonathan Turley, I came across this domino line made of 10,000 iPhone5s. It is pretty impressive. The split-second timing required to have elevators involved is amazing.
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Via Mark Frauenfelder I saw this pretty amazing magic trick by Cyril Takayama. I have absolutely no idea how it might have been done. [UPDATE: To clarify, the card trick I am referring to begins at the 7:54 mark.]
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I like watching magicians. I can never figure out how they do it and just enjoy being fooled by them. Magician Dan White appeared on Jimmy Fallon’s talk show and did the following trick.

See if you can figure it out before reading the partial spoiler after the jump.
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In order to have cars and trucks share the same space with more vulnerable pedestrians and cyclists, we have created a whole system of rules and regulations designed to smooth the flow and prevent accidents. But is that the only way to go? Some argue that when there are rules, people do not really pay attention to their surroundings, thinking that just following the rules is enough.
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No doubt all of us have as children played ‘ballooning’, where we try to keep a balloon in the air for as long as possible without actually holding on to it. Those who are more agile use only their feet or limit themselves in other ways. But could you do it with just your nose?
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