Review (Guest): The Empire of Necessity – Slavery, Freedom, and Deception in the New World

Greg Grandin The complexity of the moral landscape during America’s founding generation, March 2, 2014 Herbert L Calhoun “paulocal” The reader is unlikely to find a book that better contextualizes or sharpens the focus of the moral issues confronting America’s founding generation than this book. Using the metaphor of “empires of necessity,” the author shows …

Winslow Wheeler: Chuck Hagel on the A-10 – Without a Clue or Without Scruples?

Pierre Sprey and I have authored an analysis of Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel’s statements this past Monday on the A-10.  It follows: Chuck Hagel’s A-10 Legacy By Winslow T. Wheeler & Pierre M. Sprey When he spoke about next year’s defense budget on February 24, Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel addressed his decision to …

Patrick Meier: Using Crowd Computing to Analyze UAV Imagery for Search & Rescue Operations — Starkly Opposite USAF Gorgon Stare in Cost, Utility, & Sensibility

Using Crowd Computing to Analyze UAV Imagery for Search & Rescue Operations My brother recently pointed me to this BBC News article on the use of drones for Search & Rescue missions in England’s Lake District, one of my favorite areas of the UK. The picture below is one I took during my most recent visit. In …

Berto Jongman: How visualising data has changed life…and saved lives

How visualising data has changed life… and saved lives From John Graunt’s ‘bills of mortality’ to Florence Nightingale’s revolutionary ‘rose charts’, the distillation of information into graphics has been a vital tool for scientists Nicola Davis The Observer, Saturday 15 February 2014 Big data, infographics, visualisations – the pop words of a modern phenomenon. But …