We should be adult enough to say something as juvenile as, "Wow, your god used to think if you eat meat on Fridays you’d go to hell? Interesting, but I don’t understand that at all. Tell me more". The law of the bus stop: Adolescent behaviour isn't getting any worse, but our media-fuelled obsession with it is. You Don't Say: The celebrity interview is an exercise in ersatz intimacy. Let's talk about reinventing it. From the Freakonomics Quorum, a look at the economics of street charity. A review of Cracks in the Constitution by Ferdinand Lundberg.  The eyes have it: What do we see when we look at ads? First Prize for Weird: A bizarre substance, like "frozen smoke", may clean up rivers, run cell phones and power spaceships. The Numbers Guy on The Mystery of the Median. 

A review of When The Press Fails by W. Lance Bennett, Regina G. Lawrence and Steven Livingston and Dark Days in the Newsroom: McCarthyism Aimed at the Press by Edward Alwood. A look at how more black women consider "dating out". Left Out: "Gay recovering leftist" explores why the dating life of a political minority can be lonely. The introduction to Services and Employment: Explaining the U.S.-European Gap. A review of Factory of Dreams: A History of Meccano Ltd, 1901-1979 by Kenneth D. Brown. From American History, an article on the curious history of the Purple Heart. Where black and brown collide: The struggle for political dominance pits natural allies against each other. From Forward, an article on the death of genuine dissent in Judaism.

From National Geographic, How to Survive (Almost) Anything: When it comes to surviving a crisis situation, we tend to rely on what we think we know. But sometimes second-guessing yourself is the key to getting out alive. The introduction to Freedom's Orphans: Contemporary Liberalism and the Fate of American Children by David L. Tubbs. So what would it mean to take seriously Jesus' injunction to love our neighbours? How could we recover a sense of the proximity of love? And how could we take seriously the geography of this ethical vision? A review of Plain Secrets: An Outsider Among the Amish by Joe Mackall. The pay phone, 100 or so, served us well in another era: Fewer and fewer people use public pay phones. As prices rise, experts wonder if they have a future. User’s guide: Some habits are rational to acquire but addicts should quit when the need arises.