Food and statistical analysis are two NPI (or Josh) favorites. Michael Lander combines them, performing a statistical analysis of pizza ratings in NYC to find that coal ovens are the most significant determinant of a highly-rated pie.
We almost always recommend something from it, but consider reading this week’s NY Times Magazine cover to cover: It’s the 9th Annual Year in Ideas Issue and it features an interview with eminent University of Chicago Philosopher Martha Nussbaum.
When we read Russian lit–and you know we do–we do our best to procure the translation by the husband and wife team of Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky. The Millions recently did an interview with the pair about their methods, philosophies, and future projects.
Food is a big part of Thanksgiving. Which food that is, though, depends in part on what region of the country you’re from. Check out this “infographic” which shows where search queries for different Thanksgiving foods came from geographically.
Speaking of baseball and sabermetrics, as free agency hits, here’s an older piece from Patrick Brown of The Millions about baseball and its relationship with the Internet, including an in-depth analysis of gamecasts and the polarizing nature of J.D. Drew.
For people who like movies and graphs, it doesn’t get much better than xkcd’s breakdown of Lord of the Rings, Star Wars, and Jurassic Parkin graphical terms. Or does it? Vodkaster put together a subway map of the 250 best movies of all time, with different genres represented as different lines. Excellent stuff.
John S talked about the problem of aggregating sites way back in August; now, Craig Fehrman of The Big Money wonders why sports aggregators seem to engender less ill will than those of the news variety. We’re not going to tell you what sites John and Fehrman concentrate on, or what they conclude, or what the irony about connecting those two pieces is, lest we be confused with an aggregator ourselves.
Too big to win? We can only wonder what adjective Slate could have used if Jim McGreevey had stayed in the race six years ago.
Puttingasideouraffectionforsuperlatives, we’d prefer it if Esquire had named Kate Beckinsale just “Among the Sexier Women Alive” instead of going all-out. Nevertheless, she knows how to rise our lycans, if you know what we mean. (And no, we can’t believe that was the THIRD Underworld movie and there’s already a fourth in production, either.)
Speaking of sexiest thises and thats, check out Deadspin/Jeff Pearlman’s humorous account of how Chiefs’ quarterback Elvis Grbac was accidentally named People‘s “Sexiest Athlete.” The last sentence of People entry was “His personality makes him attractive.” Unfortunately (and somewhat surprisingly), Tim did not spot a single Grbac jersey during his adventure at Arrowhead Stadium earlier last weekend.
Speaking of Deadspin (we’re on a roll with the transitions), they detailed the seedy underground of NBA scorekeeping, where not everyone plays by the rules and the figures don’t always add up.
And the final word on that Yanks-Twins series: This is the real reason Minnesota was so upset about Phil Cuzzi’s blown call down the left-field line. Who knows what Jason Kubel could have done with Mauer on second?
