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Von Neumann with Robert Oppenheimer When people think about the Greatest Scientists of All Time, there are only three names that should come to mind: Isaac Newton, Charles Darwin, and Albert Einstein. The case for each is obviously strong. All three possessed superior intellect and each made revolutionary contributions to a field science. Newton revolutionized mathematics and physics. There is a case to be made that another person might be more influential and more important.

The cross is the symbol of Christianity, the focal image in many interpretations of the Gospels, and a great example of how the meaning of words have developed over time, in some aspects, disconnecting modern Christianity from its roots in Jesus’s teaching. The "cross" as it is known today, a vertical post and with a crossing member, was unknown when Jesus taught and for centuries after. The Greek word translated as "

This article discusses the Greek word, logos, which is usually mistranslated in English Bibles as “word.” As we will see, the Greek word has a variety of connected meanings, but logos does not mean “word.” The people of Jesus’s era would have never heard it that ways, certainly not in the sense of referring to the Bible or Jesus’s words. The Greek word the means “word” is lexis, familiar to us as the source of English words such as lexicon.

The Green Oak Guardian is a sort of vaguely environmentalist superhero featured in his own comic book, drawn in strong, simple lines like the old Dick Tracy newspaper strips. The movie that bears his name is the tale of his spring to life — sorta — when a Hollywood big shot arrives in town to play the Guardian in a film version. Grayson Kane (Houston Rhines) is a tall, rugged sort who looks like he should ably fill out a superhero costume.

At long last, the call arrived from the authorized dealer, concerning a timepiece I ordered 2 years and 4 months ago. This highly sought-after watch was now ready to be shipped from Oldenzaal, a small city located in the eastern Netherlands, a place half a world away from me. The masterful artisans behind this creation were two brothers, representing the third generation of watchmakers in their family from that town.

One of my favorite things about MLB the Show is how random professional players can randomly turn into fan favorites. Case in point: Adalberto Mondesi, the former switch-hitting shortstop of the Kansas City Royals who, despite a pedestrian career, is – pun intended – MLB the Show royalty. Mondesi first jumped on player radars with a Player of the Month card in 2018 after having a silver card that was a Battle Royale favorite.

Jimmy Buffett, who died last week, wrote mostly straightforward songs. One asked, “Why Don’t We Get Drunk and Screw?” His narrators tended to let go of deep thoughts. One describes taking off a weekend “just to try and recall the whole year,” but abandoning the effort: “Ran into a chum / with a bottle of rum / and we wound up drinking all night.” The songwriter himself described it all as “pure escapism,” and the emotions expressed are often simple and sweet.

I encountered 1960's "The Hand" while looking to find a copy of the 1981 film of the same name starring Michael Caine. The second feature film directed by Oliver Stone, 1981's "The Hand" has a trashy reputation as a piece of schlock about an egotistic cartoonist who loses his hand in an accident, only to the see the dismembered appendage start killing his enemies before turning its ire on him. It has one of those "

Old ideas die hard. It’s been 20 years since happiness economists (yes, they’re a thing!) began publishing papers indicating that conventional wisdom is wrong: ***The happiest times of our lives are not when we are young or even in our thirties. ***The “midlife crisis” is not an acute event but rather a transition period of several years. ***After 50, comes a time of rising satisfaction. ***Old age is generally not sad but happy.