thanks to Ben Rosen for the image and to SCOTUS, Bree Newsome, and everyone else for the justice.
All posts by jonfwilkins
Tim Hunt and Academic Freedom
If you listen to the mewling of elite scientists and the hand-wringing of the conservative media, academic freedom is once again under attack by the gangs of social-media-wielding PC conformity enforcers. This week’s victim is Nobel laureate Tim Hunt, following his comments about the dangers of mixed-sex scientific laboratories.
If you haven’t been following this story, here’s a brief timeline of events to catch you up:
- 1943: Richard Timothy Hunt is born in the small town of Neston, located in Cheshire, England.
- 1982: Hunt discovers the first cyclin molecule while studying the cell cycle of sea urchins
- 2001: Hunt shares the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine with Paul Nurse and Leland Hartwell for discovering the molecular mechanisms that control progression of the cell cycle (e.g., cyclins).
- 2015: Hunt attends the World Conference of Science Journalists is Seoul, South Korea.
- June 9: Hunt gives a speech to a lunch for female scientists and journalists, during which he says, “Let me tell you about my trouble with girls. Three things happen when they are in the lab. You fall in love with them, they fall in love with you, and when you criticize them, they cry”.
- June 10: Hunt resigns from his position at University College London
- June 13: Hunt said in an interview with the Guardian that he had been forced out without having an opportunity to defend himself or present his side
- June 15: UCL issued a dubious statement, citing Hunt’s “personal decision to offer his resignation” and claiming that the media response had no influence on their decision to accept it
Since then, a number of prominent scientists have gone to the press to criticize UCL’s firing of Hunt (e.g., here, here, and here, all paywalled). The defenses of Hunt involve the typical overwrought rhetoric. For example, Andre Geim claimed that Hunt had been “crucified”, while Richard Dawkins referred to “the baying witch-hunt that it unleashed among our academic thought police”. (Aside to Dawkins: it is tacky to refer to a backlash against sexism as a witch hunt, for much the same reason that it is tacky to refer to a backlash against racism as a lynch mob.) But behind the rhetoric, there are basically two complaints. One, that UCL’s firing of Hunt was a disproportionate response, given the nature of the transgression, and two, that the response would have a “chilling effect” on academic speech.
I actually agree with the first point. It strikes me that a more appropriate response would be some combination of public shaming and sensitivity training. According to many of the people who have come forward to support Hunt, he is an intelligent, kind-hearted person. If that is true, then someone needs to make sure he understands how comments like this — even made as jokes — contribute to a culture of sexism, doing real, if indirect, harm to scientists and to science. (And if it’s true, he should be invested in learning this lesson.)
On the other hand, maybe this is just the most recent incident in a longstanding pattern of sexist behavior. If so, Hunt should absolutely be fired, as should every administrator who ignored that behavior up until June 9.
I suspect the truth is somewhere in the middle. Hunt jokingly refers to himself as a chauvinist, and many of the defenses have accused people of “not getting” his sense of humor. That suggests that he has probably been making mildly sexist, mildly harmful comments for decades, and the he has probably been approached about it many times in the past. In the manner of successful people of a certain age, he may have blithely disregarded that criticism, implicitly assuming that there was absolutely nothing he needed to change about his own behavior. If that’s right, maybe this will serve as a wake-up call — unless he gets seduced by the appeal of wallowing in his own victimhood.
No matter what the actual story is, though, UCL’s response was terrible, and would be galling if it were not so depressingly familiar. The fact is, this is the sort of scapegoating that institutions — including universities — do all the time. Despite UCL’s disingenuous protestations to the contrary, it seems clear that Hunt was fired not for sexist beliefs or behaviors or comments, but for embarrassing UCL. By firing Hunt, UCL is able to make a big show of standing up for equality, while avoiding doing the much harder work of addressing systematic sexism in science.
The formula is this:
- Let systematic unfairness persist, because addressing it involves effort and risks alienating powerful people who currently benefit from that unfairness
- If anything goes wrong, deny that there is a problem and cover things up
- If media attention makes strategy unsustainable, blame the individual, distancing your institution from them and disparaging them however possible
- Claim that the problem was “a few bad apples”, and now the institution is 100% cured
- Repeat
It’s the same formula for sexual harassment and scientific misconduct in universities, for insider trading and market manipulation in financial firms, and for fabrication of evidence and murder of civilians in police departments. The only somewhat surprising thing here was the speed with which UCL skipped from stage 1 to stage 3.
What is Academic Free Speech?
The issue of free expression is more complicated. As everyone should know by now, freedom of speech does not mean freedom from consequences. The fact that you have a right to say something does not mean that you have a right not to be criticized. And, even in the US, where free speech has explicit constitutional protection, you can be lose your job if you say something that causes embarrassment for your employer.
But for freedom of academic expression to be meaningful, it has to be subject to a higher level of protection. As an academic, your job is to seek truth and to share it. Your job must be protected if, in the course of your truth seeking, you say something that is embarrassing or distasteful to your department or university. Without that protection, any claims of academic freedom are hollow. And it does not matter if we are talking about tenured professorships, or honorary appointments, like Hunt’s position at UCL. While these distinctions may affect the legality of firing someone for something they say, it doesn’t change the ethical considerations.
The question then becomes, What is academic speech? Is it any statement made by an academic? Any public statement? It can not be either of these, because then we would be providing protections not to a particular class of speech, but to a particular class of people — people who, by the way, already occupy a position of relative privilege. Instead, we need to limit these protections to speech that is intended as a contribution to academic discourse.
Were Tim Hunt’s comments academic speech, then? It depends. If, as some have suggested, these comments were “just a joke”, then no. A joke that you make at a scientific conference is just regular speech. If you make an offensive joke at a conference, and you are punished for it, your academic speech has not been curtailed. If he was not being serious, then UCL does not owe him any special consideration.
On the other hand, we can interpret the comments as an articulation of the potential negative consequences of male-female dynamics in a laboratory setting. How the composition of a lab group affects the process and progress of science is certainly a legitimate subject of academic inquiry. We could say that Hunt has put forward the following hypothesis: Due to the complications that arise from romantic feelings, as well as systematic differences in the ways that men and women communicate, mixed-sex laboratories are less desirable than single-sex laboratories.
If we say no, you are not allowed to discuss or investigate that hypothesis, because challenges an inviolable assumption that men and women are equal, or even interchangeable, we would absolutely be constraining academic freedom. If we care about academic inquiry, we have to stand together and defend the right of Tim Hunt — or anyone else — to ask questions like this.
But . . .
If we agree to treat and defend Hunt’s statements as a form of academic speech, we also have to evaluate it as academic speech. The problem is, as academic speech, it is appalling — not because of its conclusions, but because of its profound lack of adherence to the most basic scholarly standards. This is a vague interpretation of anecdotal evidence, presented and interpreted in a vacuum that ignores any cultural context or consequences. Worse, from a purely academic perspective, it completely ignores any and all prior scholarship on the topic. If I got this in an undergraduate paper, I would probably give it a C+ — in the context of contemporary grade inflation.
To claim that mixed-sex labs are bad because you have had unpleasant (and perhaps inappropriate) interactions with women is not intellectually very different from claiming that global warming is not real because you were cold last winter.
It is 100% legitimate to ask about the consequences of having men and women working together in the same laboratory. But if you are going to ask about that, here are at least a few of the things you need to consider before you open your mouth.
- What does the empirical data say about scientific productivity, or career success, as a function of the composition of males and females in a laboratory?
- If we accept the assertion that women cry more. . . Is crying necessarily a bad thing? Is it because they respond more emotionally than men do to the same criticism, or is it because they receive harsher criticism? If women cry when you criticize them, why do you seem to assume that the women have a responsibility to toughen up, and not that you have a responsibility to be less abrasive?
- Given that getting a good postdoc or faculty position depends substantially on connections and letters of recommendation, wouldn’t segregation perpetuate any historical inequalities?
- If we accept the idea that men and women think and behave in systematically different ways . . . Does the benefit of avoiding the occasional uncomfortable situation outweigh the benefits of having a more diverse set of brains thinking about scientific questions?
- How does your analysis change when you consider the fact that not all scientists are heterosexual?
I’m sure there are plenty more considerations. This isn’t my field, so I don’t really know what they all are. The point is, it’s not Tim Hunt’s field either. That does not mean that he could not make a legitimate contribution. After all, he seems to be a very intelligent person, and he has decades of personal experience in the laboratory setting. But if he legitimately wants to contribute to this discussion, he has a responsibility to think deeply about it, and to grapple with the decades of work by other very intelligent people who have thought deeply about it. If he is having trouble, a little time on Google Scholar or a stroll over to one of the many Sociology departments in London would set him on the right track.
I’ve never met Tim Hunt. I’ve met a few of the people who have defended him, but I don’t know any of them well. So, I’m not in a good position to judge what he is like as a person. However, the picture seems to be of a smart, decent human being who has done a lot of good. It would be a damn shame if the outcome of this was that he was excluded from science. It would also be a damn shame if the take-home lesson from this was that academic freedom is only safe if treat the ill-considered opinions of senior academics with a sort of breathless reverence.
Here’s What’s Up with the Color of that Dress
After the continuation of net neutrality and the onset of the llama revolution, the most exciting thing to hit the internet yesterday was this dress, which some people claim is white and gold, while others claim it is blue and black.
Buzzfeed has been running a poll. As of right now, the results are running 71% white and gold versus 29% blue and black. Gawker media is also on the case, concluding that everyone is an idiot, while Slate says you’re looking at the dress wrong.
Here’s what I think is going on. First off, here are the two colors, extracted from the image and presented out of context:
To me, that’s a sort-of steely blue-gray on the left and brown with maybe a hint of gold on the right. According to Adobe Illustrator, the RGB values are: R: 140, G: 146, B: 185 on the left and R: 137, G: 115, B:81 on the right. Depending on where, exactly you sample from, the values vary a bit, obviously, but are always pretty close to these.
In each case, these values are on a scale that runs from 0 to 255. So that means the Red and Green channels are running at about 50% in both cases. If all three were 50%, we would have something that looked like a middle-of-the-road gray. Relative to that, we have some extra blue on the left, and we have some blue taken away on the right. So we can think of the blue-gray as a bluish gray. The brown we can think of as a yellowish gray, or maybe an orangish gray.
So, those are the actual colors in the picture, but the color of the dress is a different question. Why is it that some people look at the top photo and see a white dress with gold trim, while others see a blue dress with black trim?
What I think we have here is a case where there are two different effects, both relating to the fact that our perception of colors is affected by context. What is special in this case is that the two effects are pushing our perception in opposite directions. Plus, they are balanced in magnitude, so which of the two dominates varies from person to person, and can be influenced by little details, like the angle at which you view your computer screen, background lighting, etc. In fact, some people see the colors spontaneously flipping from white-gold to blue-black or vice versa. It’s basically this thing from the New Yorker:
The first effect is we perceive colors in a way that enhances their contrast with nearby colors. Look at these boxes. If you’re like most people, the small square on the left looks like it is a lighter color of gray than the small square on the right:
But in fact, those two center squares are exactly the same shade of gray. The one on the left looks lighter because it is surrounded by a darker gray. The one on the right looks lighter because it is surrounded by a lighter gray. Here are the same two squares with the context removed:
This is a perfectly reasonable thing for your eyes to do, because, in the real world, the intensity of light in the environment varies. If you’re looking for berries to eat, you want to perceive a strawberry in a shady spot as the same type of thing as a strawberry in a sunny spot. So, when everything is dark and shady, you correct your perception, saying essentially that this strawberry must actually be brighter than it looks. Similarly under bright sunlight, you would (correctly) infer that the berry is actually darker than it appears.
The color surrounding much of the dress in the photo is a very bright white. In this context, we perceive the colors as being darker and more saturated than they are, yielding a rich blue and a very dark brown verging on black.
But there’s another way that this correction can play out. Look at this picture:
The punchline here is that the squares labeled A and B are actually exactly the same color (as illustrated in the lower-left corner of the photo. Here, part of the effect is due to the fact that square A is surrounded by lighter squares, and therefore appears darker than it is, while square B is surrounded by darker squares, and appears lighter. But another part of the effect is due to the fact that we perceive a light source off to the right, and we see that the green cylinder is casting a shadow. Since we know that square B is in this shadow, we correct for this, perceiving it not as a gray square, but as a white square that is in the shadows.
In the dress picture, the light is coming from behind the dress, so the entire side of the dress that we can see is in its own shadow. We correct for this by perceiving not a blue-gray dress, but a white dress that has been photographed with horrible backlighting. We implicitly assume that the darkness is an artifact of the photograph.
We can recreate these two effects by taking our original two colors and either shifting them away from white (recreating the effect of perceiving something against a white background), or shifting them towards white (recreating the effect of perceiving something photographed with a light source behind it).
Here, I’ve corrected the saturation and blackness values 1/3 of the way from the original (left) towards pure white (center) or pure black (right):
And here, I’ve corrected all three RGB values 1/3 of the way from the original (left) towards pure white (center) or pure black (right).
So, when you look at the dress, part of your visual system is saying, “Wow, everything is so bright! This dress must actually be really dark in order to look like this!” But another part of your visual system is saying, “Wow, what a horrible shadow! This dress must actually be really bright in order to look like this!”
What is so cool about the picture is that it seems to trigger both of these corrections in roughly equal measure. But just as our perception of a duck-rabbit picture snaps back and forth between duck and rabbit (but it is hard to see both at the same time), our brain chooses one of the two interpretations of the dress photo, and jumps in with both feet. Small differences in our visual systems — or the specific details of the context in which we view the photo — determine which way it jumps. For instance, I find it easier to see the white and gold dress when I look at the top part of the photo (where the backlighting is strongest), and can see the blue and black dress best at the bottom.
John Oliver is Back and Taking on Drug Reps
Man, John Oliver’s three-month hiatus felt soooo long. But on Sunday, he returned with his particular brand of investigative comic journalism. This week’s in-depth subject was the corrupting effect that pharmaceutical drug reps have on the prescribing practices of physicians.
Hey look! Mississippi and West Virginia lead the Nation in Something Good!
You know, most of the time when you hear “Mississippi leads the nation in . . .”, it is the lead-in either to a joke or a really depressing statistic. But check out this map from the Washington Post:
All 50 states require vaccination, and all 50 provide for medical exemptions, which is good. But 48 of the 50 also provide religious or “personal belief” exemptions.
Personally, I am most bothered by states that have one or the other of these, and not both. Because saying that you can opt out on the basis of a religious belief, but not a personal one puts the state implicitly in the position of deciding what does and does not qualify as a religion. Doing it the other way around just seems weird, since religious beliefs are personal beliefs held for religious reasons, right?
But only two states have the right law: straight-up requirements for vaccination with only medical exemptions. So, if your children’s health is being threatened by sanctimonious morons spouting discredited pseudo-science about autism, or mercury, or argle blargle pharmaceuticals something something, just remember, if you lived in a less retrograde state, like Mississippi or West Virginia, you wouldn’t have to put up with this bullshit.
Darwin Eats Cake site redesign
When I first set up the website for Darwin Eats Cake, I used something called Comic CMS, an open-source content-management system written by “Steve H”. It’s a really nice little thing, with a clean appearance, a friendly GUI, and built-in functionality for posting news, scheduling comic publication, and so forth.
But then, “Steve H” got a “job”, and is no longer maintaining the program. So, things started to degrade. I was able to plug holes with virtual duck tape for a while, but it was getting to the point where I was breaking as many things as I was fixing.
Finally, I decided to build a completely new site using Drupal. This required some spin-up time, but the basic site is up and running now. I’m going to be adding new features, and I’m working my way through the comics increasing the resolution, but you can go there, flip through the back-catalog, and hit the share buttons. And now that the basics are in place, I can get back to actually making new ones.
So start submitting your evolution questions to Guillaume’s Mailbag!
Newspaper Misattributes Quote
The News-Enterprise of Lexington, KY published a story about a ceremony to celebrate local law enforcement. Here’s the opening (via):
If that’s a little squinty for you, here’s the money paragraph:
Hardin County Sheriff John Ward said those who go into the law enforcement profession typically do it because they have a desire to shoot minorities.
The online version of the story was quickly corrected to note that Sheriff John Ward had been misquoted.
Presumably, the quotation should have been attributed to “stuff everyone knows, but no one is willing to say out loud.”
Chomskian Deep Structure of Comment Spam
There is an entire industry of spam blog comments out there. Often they take the form of either sycophantic enthusiasm or unsolicited advice. But today I was clearing out the spam comment folder, and I found this, the ur-message from which all spam comments are derived. Literally! I assume there is usually a processing step that pares this down to a single message, but somehow that did not happen this time.
Specifically, it looks like there is a nested structure something like this: { aaaa { xx | yy | zz } | bbbb }, where within each set of brackets you would choose one of the elements separated by or-pipes. So, this structure would give you aaaa xx, aaaa yy, aaaa zz, or bbbb. In the comment, we see a number of possible comments, and within each comment, there are numerous places where different phrasing can be used. Presumably the game here is to have a large enough set of combinations that spam blockers won’t zero in on a specific long sequence of words.
But here’s my favorite thing about this. Some effort has clearly gone into providing sets of alternatives that work grammatically when slotted in to the same place in each sentence. But then the rest of each sentence — the fixed part — is usually completely ungrammatical.
Anyway, it’s nice to know that someone appreciates my {great|wonderful|fantastic|magnificent|excellent} writing, even if it is just a spambot.
{
{I have|I’ve} been {surfing|browsing} online more than {three|3|2|4} hours today, yet
I never found any interesting article like yours.
{It’s|It is} pretty worth enough for me. {In my opinion|Personally|In my view},
if all {webmasters|site owners|website owners|web owners} and bloggers made good content as you did,
the {internet|net|web} will be {much more|a lot more} useful than ever before.|
I {couldn’t|could not} {resist|refrain from} commenting. {Very well|Perfectly|Well|Exceptionally well} written!|
{I will|I’ll} {right away|immediately} {take hold of|grab|clutch|grasp|seize|snatch} your {rss|rss feed} as I {can not|can’t} {in finding|find|to
find} your {email|e-mail} subscription {link|hyperlink} or {newsletter|e-newsletter}
service. Do {you have|you’ve} any? {Please|Kindly} {allow|permit|let} me
{realize|recognize|understand|recognise|know} {so
that|in order that} I {may just|may|could} subscribe.Thanks.|
{It is|It’s} {appropriate|perfect|the best} time to make some plans for the future and {it is|it’s} time
to be happy. {I have|I’ve} read this post and if I could I {want to|wish to|desire to}
suggest you {few|some} interesting things or {advice|suggestions|tips}.
{Perhaps|Maybe} you {could|can} write next articles referring to
this article. I {want to|wish to|desire to} read {more|even more} things about it!|
{It is|It’s} {appropriate|perfect|the best} time
to make {a few|some} plans for {the future|the longer term|the long run} and {it is|it’s} time to be happy.
{I have|I’ve} {read|learn} this {post|submit|publish|put up} and if
I {may just|may|could} I {want to|wish to|desire to} {suggest|recommend|counsel}
you {few|some} {interesting|fascinating|attention-grabbing} {things|issues} or {advice|suggestions|tips}.
{Perhaps|Maybe} you {could|can} write {next|subsequent} articles {relating to|referring to|regarding} this article.
I {want to|wish to|desire to} {read|learn} {more|even more}
{things|issues} {approximately|about} it!|
{I have|I’ve} been {surfing|browsing} {online|on-line} {more
than|greater than} {three|3} hours {these days|nowadays|today|lately|as
of late}, {yet|but} I {never|by no means} {found|discovered} any {interesting|fascinating|attention-grabbing} article
like yours. {It’s|It is} {lovely|pretty|beautiful} {worth|value|price} {enough|sufficient} for me.
{In my opinion|Personally|In my view}, if all {webmasters|site owners|website owners|web owners} and bloggers made {just right|good|excellent} {content|content material} as {you did|you probably did}, the {internet|net|web} {will be|shall be|might be|will probably be|can be|will likely be} {much more|a lot
more} {useful|helpful} than ever before.|
Ahaa, its {nice|pleasant|good|fastidious} {discussion|conversation|dialogue} {regarding|concerning|about|on the topic of} this {article|post|piece of writing|paragraph}
{here|at this place} at this {blog|weblog|webpage|website|web site}, I have read all that, so {now|at this time} me also commenting {here|at this place}.|
I am sure this {article|post|piece of writing|paragraph} has touched all the
internet {users|people|viewers|visitors}, its really really {nice|pleasant|good|fastidious}
{article|post|piece of writing|paragraph} on building up new {blog|weblog|webpage|website|web site}.|
Wow, this {article|post|piece of writing|paragraph} is {nice|pleasant|good|fastidious}, my {sister|younger sister} is analyzing {such|these|these kinds of}
things, {so|thus|therefore} I am going to {tell|inform|let know|convey} her.|
{Saved as a favorite|bookmarked!!}, {I really like|I like|I love} {your blog|your site|your web site|your website}!|
Way cool! Some {very|extremely} valid points! I appreciate you {writing this|penning this}
{article|post|write-up} {and the|and also the|plus
the} rest of the {site is|website is} {also very|extremely|very|also really|really} good.|
Hi, {I do believe|I do think} {this is an excellent|this is a great}
{blog|website|web site|site}. I stumbledupon it
{I will|I am going to|I’m going to|I may} {come back|return|revisit} {once again|yet again} {since I|since i have} {bookmarked|book marked|book-marked|saved as a
favorite} it. Money and freedom {is the best|is the greatest} way to change,
may you be rich and continue to {help|guide} {other people|others}.|
Woah! I’m really {loving|enjoying|digging} the template/theme of this {site|website|blog}.
It’s simple, yet effective. A lot of times it’s {very hard|very difficult|challenging|tough|difficult|hard} to get that “perfect balance”
between {superb usability|user friendliness|usability} and {visual appearance|visual appeal|appearance}.
I must say {that you’ve|you have|you’ve} done a {awesome|amazing|very good|superb|fantastic|excellent|great} job with this.{In addition|Additionally|Also}, the blog loads {very|extremely|super}
{fast|quick} for me on {Safari|Internet explorer|Chrome|Opera|Firefox}.
{Superb|Exceptional|Outstanding|Excellent} Blog!|
These are {really|actually|in fact|truly|genuinely} {great|enormous|impressive|wonderful|fantastic} ideas in {regarding|concerning|about|on the topic of} blogging.
You have touched some {nice|pleasant|good|fastidious} {points|factors|things} here.
Any way keep up wrinting.|
{I love|I really like|I enjoy|I like|Everyone loves} what you guys {are|are usually|tend
to be} up too. {This sort of|This type of|Such|This kind of} clever work and {exposure|coverage|reporting}!
Keep up the {superb|terrific|very good|great|good|awesome|fantastic|excellent|amazing|wonderful} works guys I’ve {incorporated||added|included} you
guys to {|my|our||my personal|my own} blogroll.|
{Howdy|Hi there|Hey there|Hi|Hello|Hey}! Someone in my {Myspace|Facebook} group shared this {site|website}
with us so I came to {give it a look|look it over|take a look|check
it out}. I’m definitely {enjoying|loving} the information. I’m {book-marking|bookmarking} and will
be tweeting this to my followers! {Terrific|Wonderful|Great|Fantastic|Outstanding|Exceptional|Superb|Excellent} blog
and {wonderful|terrific|brilliant|amazing|great|excellent|fantastic|outstanding|superb} {style and design|design and style|design}.|
{I love|I really like|I enjoy|I like|Everyone loves} what you guys {are|are usually|tend to be} up too.
{This sort of|This type of|Such|This kind of} clever work and
{exposure|coverage|reporting}! Keep up the {superb|terrific|very good|great|good|awesome|fantastic|excellent|amazing|wonderful} works guys I’ve {incorporated|added|included} you guys to {|my|our|my personal|my own} blogroll.|
{Howdy|Hi there|Hey there|Hi|Hello|Hey} would you mind {stating|sharing} which blog platform you’re {working with|using}?
I’m {looking|planning|going} to start my own blog {in the near future|soon} but I’m having a {tough|difficult|hard} time {making
a decision|selecting|choosing|deciding} between BlogEngine/Wordpress/B2evolution and Drupal.
The reason I ask is because your {design and style|design|layout} seems different
then most blogs and I’m looking for something {completely unique|unique}.
P.S {My apologies|Apologies|Sorry} for {getting|being} off-topic but I had to ask!|
{Howdy|Hi there|Hi|Hey there|Hello|Hey} would you mind letting me know which {webhost|hosting
company|web host} you’re {utilizing|working with|using}?
I’ve loaded your blog in 3 {completely different|different}
{internet browsers|web browsers|browsers} and I must say this blog
loads a lot {quicker|faster} then most. Can you {suggest|recommend} a good {internet
hosting|web hosting|hosting} provider at a {honest|reasonable|fair} price?
{Thanks a lot|Kudos|Cheers|Thank you|Many thanks|Thanks}, I appreciate it!|
{I love|I really like|I like|Everyone loves} it {when people|when individuals|when folks|whenever people} {come together|get together} and share {opinions|thoughts|views|ideas}.
Great {blog|website|site}, {keep it up|continue the good work|stick
with it}!|
Thank you for the {auspicious|good} writeup. It in fact was a amusement account it.
Look advanced to {far|more} added agreeable from you!
{By the way|However}, how {can|could} we communicate?|
{Howdy|Hi there|Hey there|Hello|Hey} just wanted to give you a quick heads up.
The {text|words} in your {content|post|article} seem to be
running off the screen in {Ie|Internet explorer|Chrome|Firefox|Safari|Opera}.
I’m not sure if this is a {format|formatting} issue or something to do with {web browser|internet browser|browser} compatibility but I {thought|figured} I’d post to let
you know. The {style and design|design and style|layout|design} look great though!
Hope you get the {problem|issue} {solved|resolved|fixed}
soon. {Kudos|Cheers|Many thanks|Thanks}|
This is a topic {that is|that’s|which is} {close to|near to} my heart…{Cheers|Many thanks|Best wishes|Take care|Thank you}!
{Where|Exactly where} are your contact details
though?|
It’s very {easy|simple|trouble-free|straightforward|effortless} to find out any {topic|matter} on {net|web} as compared to {books|textbooks}, as I found this {article|post|piece of writing|paragraph} at this {website|web site|site|web page}.|
Does your {site|website|blog} have a contact page?
I’m having {a tough time|problems|trouble} locating it but, I’d like to
{send|shoot} you an {e-mail|email}. I’ve got some {creative ideas|recommendations|suggestions|ideas} for your blog you might be interested in hearing.
Either way, great {site|website|blog} and I look forward to seeing
it {develop|improve|expand|grow} over time.|
{Hola|Hey there|Hi|Hello|Greetings}! I’ve been {following|reading} your {site|web site|website|weblog|blog} for {a
long time|a while|some time} now and finally got the {bravery|courage} to go ahead and
give you a shout out from {New Caney|Kingwood|Huffman|Porter|Houston|Dallas|Austin|Lubbock|Humble|Atascocita} {Tx|Texas}!Just wanted to {tell you|mention|say} keep up the
{fantastic|excellent|great|good} {job|work}!|
Greetings from {Idaho|Carolina|Ohio|Colorado|Florida|Los angeles|California}!
I’m {bored to tears|bored to death|bored} at work so I decided to {check out|browse} your {site|website|blog} on my iphone during
lunch break. I {enjoy|really like|love} the {knowledge|info|information} you
{present|provide} here and can’t wait to take a look when I get home.
I’m {shocked|amazed|surprised} at how {quick|fast}
your blog loaded on my {mobile|cell phone|phone} .. I’m not even using
WIFI, just 3G .. {Anyhow|Anyways}, {awesome|amazing|very good|superb|good|wonderful|fantastic|excellent|great} {site|blog}!|
Its {like you|such as you} {read|learn} my {mind|thoughts}!
You {seem|appear} {to understand|to know|to grasp} {so much|a lot}
{approximately|about} this, {like you|such as you}
wrote the {book|e-book|guide|ebook|e book} in it or something.
{I think|I feel|I believe} {that you|that you simply|that you just} {could|can} do with {some|a few} {%|p.c.|percent}
to {force|pressure|drive|power} the message {house|home} {a bit|a little bit}, {however|but} {other than|instead of}
that, {this is|that is} {great|wonderful|fantastic|magnificent|excellent} blog.{A great|An excellent|A fantastic} read. {I’ll|I will} {definitely|certainly} be back.|
I visited {multiple|many|several|various} {websites|sites|web sites|web
pages|blogs} {but|except|however} the audio {quality|feature} for audio songs {current|present|existing} at
this {website|web site|site|web page} is {really|actually|in fact|truly|genuinely} {marvelous|wonderful|excellent|fabulous|superb}.|
{Howdy|Hi there|Hi|Hello}, i read your blog {occasionally|from time to time} and i own a similar one and i was just {wondering|curious} if you
get a lot of spam {comments|responses|feedback|remarks}? If so how do you {prevent|reduce|stop|protect against} it, any plugin or anything you can {advise|suggest|recommend}?
I get so much lately it’s driving me {mad|insane|crazy} so any {assistance|help|support} is very much appreciated.|
Greetings! {Very helpful|Very useful} advice {within this|in this
particular} {article|post}! {It is the|It’s the} little
changes {that make|which will make|that produce|that will make} {the biggest|the
largest|the greatest|the most important|the most
significant} changes. {Thanks a lot|Thanks|Many
thanks} for sharing!|
{I really|I truly|I seriously|I absolutely} love {your blog|your
site|your website}.. {Very nice|Excellent|Pleasant|Great} colors & theme.
Did you {create|develop|make|build} {this website|this site|this web site|this amazing site} yourself?
Please reply back as I’m {looking to|trying to|planning to|wanting to|hoping to|attempting to} create {my own|my very own|my own personal} {blog|website|site} and {would like to|want to|would love to} {know|learn|find out} where you
got this from or {what the|exactly what the|just what the} theme {is called|is named}.
{Thanks|Many thanks|Thank you|Cheers|Appreciate it|Kudos}!|
{Hi there|Hello there|Howdy}! This {post|article|blog post} {couldn’t|could not} be written {any better|much better}!
{Reading through|Looking at|Going through|Looking through} this
{post|article} reminds me of my previous roommate!He {always|constantly|continually} kept {talking about|preaching about} this.
{I will|I’ll|I am going to|I most certainly will} {forward|send} {this article|this information|this post} to him.
{Pretty sure|Fairly certain} {he will|he’ll|he’s going to} {have a good|have a very good|have a great} read.
{Thank you for|Thanks for|Many thanks for|I appreciate you for} sharing!|
{Wow|Whoa|Incredible|Amazing}! This blog looks {exactly|just} like
my old one! It’s on a {completely|entirely|totally} different {topic|subject} but it has pretty much the
same {layout|page layout} and design. {Excellent|Wonderful|Great|Outstanding|Superb} choice of colors!|
{There is|There’s} {definately|certainly} {a lot to|a great deal to} {know about|learn about|find out about} this {subject|topic|issue}.
{I like|I love|I really like} {all the|all of the} points {you
made|you’ve made|you have made}.|
{You made|You’ve made|You have made} some {decent|good|really good} points there.
I {looked|checked} {on the internet|on the web|on the net} {for more info|for more information|to find out more|to learn more|for additional information} about the issue
and found {most individuals|most people} will go along with your
views on {this website|this site|this web site}.|
{Hi|Hello|Hi there|What’s up}, I {log on to|check|read} your
{new stuff|blogs|blog} {regularly|like every week|daily|on a regular basis}.
Your {story-telling|writing|humoristic} style is {awesome|witty}, keep {doing what you’re doing|up the good work|it up}!|
I {simply|just} {could not|couldn’t} {leave|depart|go away}
your {site|web site|website} {prior to|before} suggesting that I {really|extremely|actually} {enjoyed|loved} {the standard|the usual} {information|info} {a person|an individual} {supply|provide} {for your|on your|in your|to your} {visitors|guests}?
Is {going to|gonna} be {back|again} {frequently|regularly|incessantly|steadily|ceaselessly|often|continuously} {in order to|to}
{check up on|check out|inspect|investigate cross-check} new
posts|
{I wanted|I needed|I want to|I need to} to thank you for this {great|excellent|fantastic|wonderful|good|very
good} read!! I {definitely|certainly|absolutely} {enjoyed|loved} every {little bit of|bit of} it.
{I have|I’ve got|I have got} you {bookmarked|book marked|book-marked|saved as a favorite}
{to check out|to look at} new {stuff you|things
you} post…|
{Hi|Hello|Hi there|What’s up}, just wanted to {mention|say|tell you}, I {enjoyed|liked|loved} this {article|post|blog post}.It was {inspiring|funny|practical|helpful}. Keep on posting!|
{Hi there|Hello}, I enjoy reading {all of|through}
your {article|post|article post}. I {like|wanted}
to write a little comment to support you.|
I {always|constantly|every time} spent my half an hour to read
this {blog|weblog|webpage|website|web site}’s {articles|posts|articles
or reviews|content} {everyday|daily|every day|all the
time} along with a {cup|mug} of coffee.|
I {always|for all time|all the time|constantly|every time}
emailed this {blog|weblog|webpage|website|web site} post
page to all my {friends|associates|contacts}, {because|since|as|for the reason that} if like to read it {then|after that|next|afterward} my {friends|links|contacts} will too.|
My {coder|programmer|developer} is trying to {persuade|convince} me to
move to .net from PHP. I have always disliked the idea because of the {expenses|costs}.
But he’s tryiong none the less. I’ve been using
{Movable-type|WordPress} on {a number of|a variety of|numerous|several|various} websites
for about a year and am {nervous|anxious|worried|concerned} about switching to another platform.
I have heard {fantastic|very good|excellent|great|good} things about blogengine.net.Is there a way I can {transfer|import} all my wordpress {content|posts} into it?
{Any kind of|Any} help would be {really|greatly} appreciated!|
{Hello|Hi|Hello there|Hi there|Howdy|Good day}! I could have
sworn I’ve {been to|visited} {this blog|this web site|this website|this site|your blog} before but after {browsing through|going through|looking at} {some of the|a few of the|many of the} {posts|articles} I realized it’s new to me.
{Anyways|Anyhow|Nonetheless|Regardless}, I’m {definitely|certainly} {happy|pleased|delighted}
{I found|I discovered|I came across|I stumbled upon} it and I’ll be {bookmarking|book-marking} it and checking back {frequently|regularly|often}!|
{Terrific|Great|Wonderful} {article|work}! {This is|That is} {the type of|the kind of} {information|info} {that are meant
to|that are supposed to|that should} be shared {around the|across
the} {web|internet|net}. {Disgrace|Shame} on {the {seek|search} engines|Google}
for {now not|not|no longer} positioning this {post|submit|publish|put up} {upper|higher}!
Come on over and {talk over with|discuss with|seek advice from|visit|consult with} my {site|web site|website}
. {Thank you|Thanks} =)|
Heya {i’m|i am} for the first time here. I {came across|found} this board and I find It {truly|really} useful & it helped me
out {a lot|much}. I hope to give something back and {help|aid} others like
you {helped|aided} me.|
{Hi|Hello|Hi there|Hello there|Howdy|Greetings}, {I think|I believe|I do
believe|I do think|There’s no doubt that} {your site|your website|your web site|your blog} {might be|may be|could be|could possibly be}
having {browser|internet browser|web browser} compatibility {issues|problems}.
{When I|Whenever I} {look at your|take a look at your} {website|web
site|site|blog} in Safari, it looks fine {but when|however when|however, if|however, when} opening in {Internet Explorer|IE|I.E.}, {it has|it’s got} some overlapping issues.{I just|I simply|I merely} wanted to {give you a|provide you with a}
quick heads up! {Other than that|Apart from that|Besides that|Aside from that}, {fantastic|wonderful|great|excellent} {blog|website|site}!|
{A person|Someone|Somebody} {necessarily|essentially} {lend a hand|help|assist} to make {seriously|critically|significantly|severely} {articles|posts} {I would|I might|I’d} state.
{This is|That is} the {first|very first} time I frequented your {web page|website
page} and {to this point|so far|thus far|up to now}?
I {amazed|surprised} with the {research|analysis} you made to {create|make} {this actual|this particular} {post|submit|publish|put up} {incredible|amazing|extraordinary}.
{Great|Wonderful|Fantastic|Magnificent|Excellent} {task|process|activity|job}!|
Heya {i’m|i am} for {the primary|the first}
time here. I {came across|found} this board and I {in finding|find|to
find} It {truly|really} {useful|helpful} & it helped me out {a lot|much}.
{I am hoping|I hope|I’m hoping} {to give|to offer|to provide|to present} {something|one thing} {back|again}
and {help|aid} others {like you|such as you} {helped|aided}
me.|
{Hello|Hi|Hello there|Hi there|Howdy|Good day|Hey there}!
{I just|I simply} {would like to|want to|wish to} {give you a|offer you a} {huge|big}
thumbs up {for the|for your} {great|excellent} {info|information} {you have|you’ve got|you
have got} {here|right here} on this post. {I will be|I’ll be|I
am} {coming back to|returning to} {your blog|your site|your
website|your web site} for more soon.|
I {always|all the time|every time} used to {read|study} {article|post|piece of writing|paragraph} in news papers but now as I am a user of {internet|web|net} {so|thus|therefore} from
now I am using net for {articles|posts|articles or reviews|content},
thanks to web.|
Your {way|method|means|mode} of {describing|explaining|telling} {everything|all|the whole
thing} in this {article|post|piece of writing|paragraph} is {really|actually|in fact|truly|genuinely} {nice|pleasant|good|fastidious},
{all|every one} {can|be able to|be capable of} {easily|without difficulty|effortlessly|simply} {understand|know|be aware
of} it, Thanks a lot.|
{Hi|Hello} there, {I found|I discovered} your {blog|website|web site|site} {by means of|via|by
the use of|by way of} Google {at the same time as|whilst|even as|while} {searching for|looking for}
a {similar|comparable|related} {topic|matter|subject}, your {site|web site|website} {got here|came} up, it {looks|appears|seems|seems to be|appears to be
like} {good|great}. {I have|I’ve} bookmarked it in my google bookmarks.{Hello|Hi} there, {simply|just} {turned into|became|was|become|changed into} {aware of|alert to} your {blog|weblog} {thru|through|via} Google, {and
found|and located} that {it is|it’s} {really|truly} informative.
{I’m|I am} {gonna|going to} {watch out|be careful} for brussels.
{I will|I’ll} {appreciate|be grateful} {if you|should you|when you|in the event you|in case you|for those who|if you happen to} {continue|proceed} this {in future}.
{A lot of|Lots of|Many|Numerous} {other folks|folks|other people|people} {will
be|shall be|might be|will probably be|can be|will likely
be} benefited {from your|out of your} writing.
Cheers!|
{I am|I’m} curious to find out what blog {system|platform} {you have
been|you happen to be|you are|you’re} {working with|utilizing|using}?I’m {experiencing|having} some {minor|small} security {problems|issues} with my latest {site|website|blog} and {I would|I’d} like to find something more {safe|risk-free|safeguarded|secure}.
Do you have any {solutions|suggestions|recommendations}?|
{I am|I’m} {extremely|really} impressed with your writing skills
{and also|as well as} with the layout on your {blog|weblog}.
Is this a paid theme or did you {customize|modify} it yourself?
{Either way|Anyway} keep up the {nice|excellent} quality writing, {it’s|it is} rare to see a {nice|great} blog like this
one {these days|nowadays|today}.|
{I am|I’m} {extremely|really} {inspired|impressed} {with your|together with your|along with your} writing {talents|skills|abilities} {and also|as {smartly|well|neatly} as} with the {layout|format|structure} {for your|on your|in your|to your} {blog|weblog}.
{Is this|Is that this} a paid {subject|topic|subject matter|theme}
or did you {customize|modify} it {yourself|your
self}? {Either way|Anyway} {stay|keep} up the {nice|excellent} {quality|high quality}
writing, {it’s|it is} {rare|uncommon} {to peer|to see|to look} a {nice|great} {blog|weblog} like this one
{these days|nowadays|today}..|
{Hi|Hello}, Neat post. {There is|There’s} {a problem|an issue} {with your|together with your|along with your} {site|web site|website} in {internet|web} explorer, {may|might|could|would} {check|test} this?
IE {still|nonetheless} is the {marketplace|market} {leader|chief} and {a large|a good|a big|a huge} {part of|section of|component to|portion of|component of|element of} {other folks|folks|other people|people} will {leave out|omit|miss|pass over} your {great|wonderful|fantastic|magnificent|excellent} writing {due to|because of} this problem.|
{I’m|I am} not sure where {you are|you’re} getting your
{info|information}, but {good|great} topic. I needs to spend some
time learning {more|much more} or understanding more. Thanks for
{great|wonderful|fantastic|magnificent|excellent} {information|info}
I was looking for this {information|info} for my mission.|
{Hi|Hello}, i think that i saw you visited my {blog|weblog|website|web site|site} {so|thus}
i came to “return the favor”.{I am|I’m} {trying to|attempting
to} find things to {improve|enhance} my {website|site|web site}!I suppose its ok to use {some of|a few of
Awesome Evolution GIF
Check out this excellent evolution GIF by animator Nicolás Fong.
You can see more of his stuff at his Tumblr, which it trippy and sometimes borderline NSFW.
Chicken Day!!!
If you have not seen this one yet, let me be the first to wish you a chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken day
h/t Andrea Kuszewski, via Incredible Things