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  • Architectuul looks at the Portuguese architectural cooperative Ateliermob, here.

  • Bad Astronomer Phil Plait looks at how white dwarf WD J091405.30+191412.25 is literally vapourizing a planet in close orbit.

  • Caitlin Kelly at the Broadside Blog explains
  • Centauri Dreams looks at the slowing of the solar wind far from the Sun.

  • John Holbo at Crooked Timber considers the gap between ideals and actuals in the context of conspiracies and politics.

  • The Dragon's Tales reports on how the ESA is trying to solve a problem with the parachutes of the ExoMars probe.

  • Far Outliers reports on what Harry Truman thought about politicians.

  • Gizmodo reports on a new method for identifying potential Earth-like worlds.

  • io9 pays tribute to legendary writer, of Star Trek and much else, D.C. Fontana.

  • The Island Review reports on the football team of the Chagos Islands.

  • Joe. My. God. reports that gay Olympian Gus Kenworthy will compete for the United Kingdom in 2020.

  • JSTOR Daily looks at how early English imperialists saw America and empire through the lens of Ireland.

  • Paul Campos at Lawyers, Guns and Money does not like Pete Buttigieg.

  • The LRB Blog looks at the London Bridge terrorist attack.

  • The Map Room Blog shares a map of Prince William Sound, in Alaska, that is already out of date because of global warming.

  • Marginal Revolution questions if Cuba, in the Philippines, is the most typical city in the world.

  • The NYR Daily looks at gun violence among Arab Israelis.

  • The Planetary Society Blog considers what needs to be researched next on Mars.

  • Roads and Kingdoms tells the story of Sister Gracy, a Salesian nun at work in South Sudan.

  • The Russian Demographics Blog shares a paper noting continued population growth expected in much of Europe, and the impact of this growth on the environment.

  • Strange Maps shares a map of fried chicken restaurants in London.

  • Starts With A Bang's Ethan Siegel explains why a 70 solar mass black hole is not unexpected.

  • John Scalzi at Whatever gives his further thoughts on the Pixel 4.

  • Window on Eurasia notes that, last year, 37 thousand Russians died of HIV/AIDS.

  • Arnold Zwicky starts from a consideration of the 1948 film Kind Hearts and Coronets.

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  • The Pilot, in Yorkville, celebrates its 75th anniversary as a venue. Global News reports.

  • Some immigrant businesspeople recently bought an old Toronto Hydro building in the north of the city as a shelter for immigrants. Global News reports.

  • The backlash against the proposed condo tower at Yonge and Eglinton branded by Pharrell Williams has been swift. blogTO reports.

  • Urban Toronto notes that a 13-story mixed-use building has been proposed for 888 Dupont Street, at the corner of Dupont and Ossington.

  • A TV crew in North York last week cancelled its shoot in North York, near the site of last year's ramming attack on Yonge Street. CTV News reports.

  • A poster on r/Toronto noted last week the six-year anniversary of the admission of then-mayor Rob Ford that he smoked crack.

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  • The Ottawa Citizen reports on the first week of the Confederation Line LRT.

  • The New Brunswick city of Moncton now has new affordable housing--20 units--for vulnerable people. Global News reports.

  • CityLab looks at one photographer's perspective of the New York City skyline, changed by the 9/11 attacks.

  • An alleyway in Calgary is being transformed by art. Global News reports.

  • Birth tourism might become an election issue in the British Columbia city of Richmond. Global News reports.

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  • Bad Astronomy notes the remarkably eccentric orbit of gas giant HR 5138b.

  • Centauri Dreams notes the impact that large-scale collisions have on the evolution of planets.

  • Chris Bertram at Crooked Timber noted yesterday that babies born on September 11th in 2001 are now 18 years old, adults.

  • The Crux notes that some of the hominins in the Sima de los Huesos site in Spain, ancestors to Neanderthals, may have been murdered.

  • D-Brief reports on the cryodrakon, a pterosaur that roamed the skies above what is now Canada 77 million years ago.

  • Dangerous Minds looks at the political artwork of Jan Pötter.

  • Gizmodo notes a poll suggesting a majority of Britons would support actively seeking to communicate with extraterrestrial civilizations.

  • io9 has a loving critical review of the first Star Trek movie.

  • JSTOR Daily shares, from April 1939, an essay by the anonymous head of British intelligence looking at the international context on the eve of the Second World War.

  • Language Log notes a recent essay on the mysterious Voynich manuscript, one concluding that it is almost certainly a hoax of some kind.

  • Erik Loomis at Lawyers, Guns and Money considers the future of the labour movement in the United States.

  • Marginal Revolution considers what sort of industrial policy would work for the United States.

  • Yardena Schwartz writes at NYR Daily about the potential power of Arab voters in Israel.

  • Jim Belshaw at Personal Reflections explains why, despite interest, Australia did not launch a space program in the 1980s.

  • Drew Rowsome provides a queer review of It: Chapter Two.

  • Starts With A Bang's Ethan Siegel notes how government censorship of science doomed the Soviet Union and could hurt the United States next.

  • Window on Eurasia notes how, in the Volga republics, recent educational policy changes have marginalized non-Russian languages.

  • Arnold Zwicky shares a glossy, fashion photography-style, reimagining of the central relationship in the James Baldwin classic Giovanni's Room, arranged by Hilton Als.

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  • Centauri Dreams notes a strange corridor of ice beneath the surface of Titan, a possible legacy of an active cryovolcanic past.

  • D-Brief notes one study suggesting that, properly designed, air conditioners could convert carbon dioxide in the air into carbon fuels.

  • Dead Things reports on the discovery of an unusual human skull three hundred thousand years old in China, at Hualongdong in the southeast.

  • Gizmodo notes the identification of a jawbone 160 thousand years old, found in Tibet, with the Denisovans. That neatly explains why the Denisovans were adapted to Tibet-like environments.

  • JSTOR Daily examines Ruth Page, a ballerina who integrated dance with poetry.

  • Language Hat shares a critique of a John McWhorter comment about kidspeak.

  • Victor Mair at Language Log shares a well-researched video on the Mongolian language of Genghis Khan.

  • Paul Campos at Lawyers, Guns and Money notes how Donald Trump, in his defiance of investigative findings, is worse than Richard Nixon.

  • James Butler at the LRB Blog writes about the bombing of London gay bar Admiral Duncan two decades ago, relating it movingly to wider alt-right movements and to his own early coming out.

  • Marginal Revolution's Tyler Cowen notes a recent review article making the case for open borders, disproving many of the claims made by opponents.

  • Paul Mason at the NYR Daily explains why the critique by Hannah Arendt of totalitarianism and fascism can fall short, not least in explaining our times.

  • Corey S. Powell at Out There explains how, and why, the Moon is starting to get serious attention as a place for long-term settlement, even.

  • Emily Lakdawalla at the Planetary Society Blog explores the fund that she had in helping design a set of scientifically-accurate building blocks inspired by the worlds of our solar system.

  • Drew Rowsome reports on the new restaging of the classic queer drama Lilies at Buddies in Bad Times by Walter Borden, this one with a new racially sensitive casting.

  • Starts With A Bang's Ethan Siegel considers the massive boom of diversity at the time of the Cambrian Explosion.

  • Towleroad features the remarkable front cover of the new issue of Time, featuring Pete Buttigieg together with his husband Chasten.

  • Window on Eurasia considers if the new Russian policy of handing out passports to residents of the Donbas republics is related to a policy of trying to bolster the population of Russia, whether fictively or actually.

  • Arnold Zwicky considers the various flowers of May Day.

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  • Urban Toronto looks at the excavation site of Liberty Market Tower in Liberty Village.

  • blogTO notes that the Canada Goose has returned to Toronto, and that some geese have begun to defend their reclaimed territories.

  • This Heather Mallick column at the Toronto Star about her accidental (and unsuccessful) impromptu stabbing of an errant raccoon is just bizarre.

  • Many of the witnesses of the Yonge Street van attack last year are still struggling. Global News reports.

  • The Katherine Laidlaw profileat Toronto Life of Alek Minassian, perpetrator of last year's van attack on Yonge Street, is timely. Still: How did he come to that point in his life where that atrocity made sense?

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  • CBC Toronto reports from the Daily Bread Food Bank drive, held this past weekend, here.

  • CBC Toronto reports on the decline of small business in the Beaches, and the efforts of community leaders to reverse this decline.

  • CBC Toronto reports on the Beaches Easter Parade, held Sunday. Perhaps next year?

  • Listing Ontario Place on Toronto's heritage register, giving this site protection, is a fine idea. CBC Toronto reports.

  • Christopher Hume at the Toronto Star notes how, one year after the North York van attack, coming up with policies which protect the public while keeping the city open is difficult.

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  • Bad Astronomer Phil Plait argues that the new American plan to put people on the Moon in 2024 is unlikely to succeed in that timeframe.

  • The Broadside Blog's Caitlin Kelly considers whether or not women should travel alone, for safety reasons. (That choice is one I've not had to make myself, thanks to my male privilege; I'm very sorry others have to consider this.)

  • Centauri Dreams shares the thinking of Gregory Benford on Lurkers, self-replicating probes produced by another civilization not signaling their existence to Earth.

  • Maria Farrell at Crooked Timber argues that policy-making these days is often fundamentally ill-conceived, closing off possibilities for the future.

  • The Crux notes the remarkable powers of beet juice, as a tonic for athletes for instance.

  • D-Brief looks at the slot canyons of Titan, bearing similarities in structure and perhaps origin to like structures in Utah.

  • Andrew LePage at Drew Ex Machina, celebrating five years of blogging, links to his ten most popular posts.

  • Gizmodo notes the creation for a list of nearly two thousand nearby stars that the TESS planet-hunter might target for a search for Earth-like worlds.

  • Joe. My. God. notes that the Austrian president has confirmed the New Zealand shooter has made a financial donation to a far-right group in Austria.

  • JSTOR Daily looks at Inge Lehmann, the scientist who determined the nature of the inner core of the Earth.

  • Language Hat reports on a new scholarly publication, hundreds of pages long, gathering together the curses and profanities of the Middle East and North Africa.

  • Scott Lemieux at Lawyers, Guns and Money does not seem impressed by the argument of Mike Lee that pronatalism is a good response to global warming.

  • The Map Room Blog notes the impressive maps of Priscilla Spencer, created for fantasy books.

  • Marginal Revolution links to a paper that examines the positions of Jews in the economies of eastern Europe, as a "rural service minority".

  • The Russian Demographics Blog links to a paper noting the ways in which increased human development has, and has not, led to convergence in family structures around the world.

  • Starts With A Bang's Ethan Siegel explains how, despite the expanding universe, we can still see very distant points.

  • Frank Jacobs at Strange Maps reports on the recent mistakes made by Google Maps in Japan.

  • Yorkshire Ranter Alexander Harrowell explains why the United Kingdom, after Brexit, does not automatically become a member of the European Economic Area.

  • Arnold Zwicky takes a look at the different factors, often unrecognized, going onto the formation of nonsense names, like those of the characters from Lilo and Stitch.

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  • Bad Astronomer Phil Plait notes new evidence that the Pathfinder probe landed, on Mars, on the shores of an ancient sea.

  • The Crux reports on tholins, the organic chemicals that are possible predecessors to life, now found in abundance throughout the outer Solar System.

  • D-Brief reports on the hard work that has demonstrated some meteorites which recently fell in Turkey trace their origins to Vesta.

  • Colby King at the Everyday Sociology Blog explores sociologist Eric Klinenberg's concept of social infrastructure, the public spaces we use.

  • Far Outliers reports on a Honolulu bus announcement in Yapese, a Micronesian language spoken by immigrants in Hawai'i.

  • JSTOR Daily considers the import of the autobiography of Catherine the Great.

  • Language Hat reports, with skepticism, on the idea of "f" and "v" as sounds being products of the post-Neolithic technological revolution.

  • Marginal Revolution's Tyler Cowen is critical of the idea of limiting the number of children one has in a time of climate change.

  • Jim Belshaw at Personal Reflections reflects on death, close at hand and in New Zealand.

  • Strange Company reports on the mysterious disappearance, somewhere in Anatolia, of American cyclist Frank Lenz in 1892, and its wider consequences.

  • Starts With A Bang's Ethan Siegel identifies five types of cosmic events capable of triggering mass extinctions on Earth.

  • Towleroad reports on the frustration of many J.K. Rowling fans with the author's continuing identification of queer histories for characters that are never made explicit in books or movies.

  • Window on Eurasia has a skeptical report about a Russian government plan to recruit Russophones in neighbouring countries as immigrants.

  • Arnold Zwicky explores themes of shipwrecks and of being shipwrecked.

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  • There is a shortlist of likely marijuana store locations in Ontario that includes Yorkville in Toronto. Global News reports.

  • Éric Grenier at CBC reports that the NDP in Québec risks falling to pre-Orange Wave levels of support.

  • Former NDP leader Thomas Mulcair warns that the weakening of the NDP stance on environmental issues might led to mass defections to the Green Party. CTV has it.

  • Given the lack of any legal obligation to expedite the return of ISIS fighters holding Canadian citizenship, the Canadian government seems inclined to let them remain in detention in former ISIS territories. Global News reports.

  • Brexit is boosting the Canadian film industry, given our numerous advantages as described by the Hollywood Reporter.

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  • Bad Astronomer notes the possibility that red dwarf exoplanets might, as AU Microscopii suggests, be made deserts. Centauri Dreams also examines the possibility that red dwarf exoplanets might be starved of volatiles.

  • The Crux notes the extent to which the formation of our solar system was marked by chaos, planets careening about, looking at other planetary systems for guidance.

  • D-Brief takes a look at the latest from the endangered Ross Ice Shelf of Antarctica.

  • Joe. My. God. notes that, in the home of the Danforth shooter in Toronto, DVDs from Alex Jones' Infowars were found along with more guns and ammunition.

  • JSTOR Daily links to a paper suggesting that organic agriculture contributes to a greater extent to climate change than regular agricultural systems.

  • Lawyers, Guns and Money takes a look at the evolution of the Chinese air force.

  • Jason Davis at the Planetary Society Blog notes that the Hayabusa2 probe is looking for touchdown sites on asteroid Ryugu for sampling.

  • Roads and Kingdoms considers the humble sabich of Tel Aviv.

  • Drew Rowsome reviews the Robert Leleux memoir The Memoirs of a Beautiful Boy.

  • Strange Company shares an old news clipping reporting on the murderous ghost that, in 1914, seems to have haunted the Croguennec family of Brittany.

  • Window on Eurasia looks at the prospects for a hypothetical future Belarusian Orthodox Church.

  • At Worthwhile Canadian Initiative, Nick Rowe takes a look at the relationship between inflation and the debt/GDP ratio.

  • Arnold Zwicky looks at the picturesque community of Mollis, in mountainous central Switzerland.

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  • Anthro{dendum} considers ways to simulate urgency in simulations of climate change.

  • Bad Astronomer Phil Plait considers what could possibly have led to a Mars crater near Biblis Patera, on Tharsis, having such a flat bottom.

  • Caitlin Kelly at the Broadside Blog gives readers some tips as to what they should see in New York City.

  • Centauri Dreams notes some of the early returns sent back by the OSIRIS-REx probe from asteroid Bennu.

  • The Crux notes the limits of genetic determinism in explaining human behaviour, given the huge influence of the environment on the expression of genes and more.

  • D-Brief suggests that the rapid global dispersion of the domestic chicken, a bird visibly distinct from its wild counterparts, might make an excellent marker of the Anthropocene millions of years hence.

  • Bruce Dorminey notes that Comet 46 P/Wirtanen is set to come within a bit more than eleven million kilometres of the Earth next week, and that astronomers are ready.

  • L.M. Sacasas at The Frailest Thing suggests that the Internet, by exposing everything, makes actual innovation difficult.

  • JSTOR Daily takes a look at the innovative art of early 20th century Expressionist Charlotte Salomon, a person not only groundbreaking with her autobiographical painting series but linked to a murder mystery, too.

  • Anne Curzan writes at Lingua Franca about what she has learned in six years about blogging there abut language.

  • Sara Jayyousi writes at the LRB Blog about her experiences over time with a father imprisoned for nearly a decade and a half on false charges of supporting terrorism.

  • Marginal Revolution shares Tyler Cowen's argument that Macron's main problem is that he lacks new ideas, something to appeal to the masses.

  • Sylvain Cypel at the NYR Daily argues that Macron, arguably never that popular, is facing a Marie Antoinette moment, the Yellow Jackets filling the place of the sans culottes.

  • Drew Rowsome rightly laments the extent to which social media, including not just Facebook but even Tumblr, are currently waging a war against any visible sex in any context.

  • Starts With A Bang's Ethan Siegel explains how, in 2019, astronomers will finally have imaged the event horizon around the black hole Sagittarius A* at the heart of the Milky Way Galaxy.

  • Window on Eurasia reports on polls which suggest that young Belarusians are decidedly apolitical.

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  • Open Democracy notes how the unrestrained and unpunished violence of the far right helped doom the Weimar Republic.

  • VICE reports on a remarkable project, wherein an American in the 1930s solicited and received explanations from Germans as to why they became Nazis. (The letters' language echoes.)

  • This Adnan Khan interview at MacLean's with Russian expert Bobo Lo puts forth the origins and prospects of the Russian challenge to the world order.

  • Given the growing problems of the United States, the fact that American military power versus China or Russia cannot be guaranteed is something Canada needs to take into account. CBC reports.

  • Stephen Maher at MacLean's makes the point that, with the casual corruption of the Doug Ford government, it is as if Ontario is living a Dukes of Hazzard episode.

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  • Montréal mayor Valérie Plante outlines how, in the face of provincial government cuts to immigration in Québec, her city will continue to welcome immigrants and promote their integration, over at CTV.

  • Gothamist shares the argument of new MTA transit head Andy Byford to New York City's city council there that the city simply must spend $US 40 billion to keep the MTA running.CityLab looks at how access to water is a major political issue in Mexico City, one that local community groups are acting upon.

  • The Central American refugees in Tijuana, CityLab reports, are facing an increasing number of issues, including deteriorating conditions and local hostility.

  • A VICE interview suggests that the city of Mosul, eighteen months after ISIS, is in such a poor state of repair that a resurgence of the Islamic State is possible.

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  • Sally Pitt at CBC PEI writes at length abot the bombing campaign of Loki 7, by far the Island's most notable terrorist, here.

  • Unsurprisingly, Anne of Green Gables: The Musical was the top show of this year's Charlottetown Festival. CBC reports.
  • Massachusetts man Charles Rogers has been visiting PEI every summer for six decades. CBC reports.

  • The health of the watersheds of Covehead and Brackley Bay, on the north shore of PEI, is open to question given falling oxygen levels and rising pollution. CBC reports.

  • Stephen Desroches at CBC PEI has assembled a beautiful collection of night photos from the Island, here.

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  • Utterly changing the boundaries of Toronto's wards through an unwanted amalgamation just before an election will create chaos. The Toronto Star reports.

  • Jennifer Pagliaro notes how the City of Toronto is considering changing its definition of "affordable housing" into something more realistic, over at the Toronto Star.

  • Urban Toronto contrasts two photos recently taken on Bremner Boulevard, in the heart of the South Core.

  • Steve Maich writes in MacLean's about what tragedies, like the Danforth shooting, do and do not say about cities.

  • Enzo Dimatteo at NOW Toronto notes how the alt-right has been making use of the Danforth shooting.

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  • Atlas Obscura notes, unsurprisingly, that some cemeteries in the United States were used as parks. Why not? These can be lovely green spaces. Just look at Toronto's Mount Pleasant and Prospect cemeteries.

  • Meg Holden at The Conversation takes a look at the language, the grammar of thought, used to praise cities this day. Have we gone too far away from the skepticism of earlier decades?

  • The Guardian Cities reports on NUMTOTs, "New Urbanist Memes for Transit-Oriented Teens", the Facebook group oriented to young urbanist fans that is hugely popular. (I've joined, I admit.)

  • Open Democracy carries French-Iranian sociologist Farhad Khosrokhavar article on "jihadogenous urban structures", on neighbourhoods which can alienate young people to the point of supporting Islamist terror.

  • Guardian Cities shares photos of some of the bold concrete architecture developed in Yugoslavia.

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  • Doug Ford hired a crowd of actors to pretend to be supporters. Is this astroturfing a sign of American influence on Canadian politics? The Toronto Star reports.

  • Andrew MacDougall at MacLean's argues a question tossed off in passing by Doug Ford to Kathleen Wynne, asking where she lost her way, resonates at a deep level about her government. The article is ,a href="https://www.macleans.ca/opinion/doug-ford-nails-kathleen-wynne-to-a-losing-way/">here.

  • Steve Paikin wonders about the extent to which an unvoiced homophobia may be contributing to the low popularity levels of a Kathleen Wynne who, herself, has not done much outright wrong. His TVO blog has it.

  • NOW Toronto is entirely right to recommend people born Canadian citizens take witness, at least, of citizenship ceremonies for new Canadians. I can testify that it really is moving.

  • The Three Percenters are the latest nativist social media-driven militia group in Canada, worthy of attention and concern. CBC reports.

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  • Toronto Life has a nice photo-heavy feature sharing the experiences of some of the witnesses and survivors of the North York van attack.

  • NOW Toronto reports on the discontent of Bloordale residents with the latest proposal for development on the southwest corner of Bloor and Dufferin.

  • Prices for rental housing continue to rise beyond the city of Toronto, in the wider GTA. CBC reports.

  • The idea of a crisis of affordability for Toronto renters, with one-quarter having to pay half or more of their income in rent, is very real. The Toronto Star reports.

  • Public consultation on the plan for a Green Line network of parks, extending from Bathurst Street up to Earlscourt Park, will close on Friday. Submissions can be made here.

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