It's not Friday, but I'm even more busy than usual so here come your links.
Tom McMahon recounts a funny joke of the French kind which I'm going to be sure to tell my daughter. She already loves my wacky pronounciation of ill-informed attempts to translate English words into French.
Steve Verdon looks at Simpson's Paradox. I thought at first he was examining a new twist on Zeno's paradox, namely that month after month every magazine in the checkout lane at the supermarket proclaims that Jessica and Nick are divorcing, but somehow they never actually divorce. The other night I happened to notice that one magazine cover had Nick begging Jessica not to leave him, while the one next to it had Nick serving Jessica with divorce papers personally. But as intriguing as that paradox is, that isn't what Steve was referring to, but one that is even more of a head scratcher: the reversal of trends from several separate groups when combined into one larger group.
When my son asked me what I wanted for Christmas, I said an iPod. He and my daugther both laughed. I have Ciocco envy.
About a year ago I noticed that Abu Musab al-Zarqawi was acting out a version of Zeno's Paradox. He's the al-Qaeda guy in Iraq, still on the lam at this writing. I think this happened while the Americans were retaking Fallujah. Zarqawi eventually ran away before facing the Marine music, but one day he was quoted as predicting:
"Fight on, my Arab brothers! The American dogs are only days away from defeat!"
Then a few days later he stated:
"Jihad forever! The Americans' final defeat is only hours away!"
I was really disappointed not to hear al-Zarqawi working his way down to minutes, seconds, and beyond:
"Be strong, my brothers in arms! The American Marines are only femto-seconds away from horrible and utter defeat! In fact, by the time you read the period at the end of this sentence America and all its Zionist allies will exist no more."
I think what happened is that somebody in the bunker with more knowledge of mathematics pulled al-Zarqawi aside and said to him, "Hey Abu, buddy - I know you're a big ol' jihad dude and everything; but you can't predict your way out of a paper bag!"