are we getting dumber?

     For all the press ink spent on the subject of  IQ, or intelligence quotient (the results of a test given to people to find out how "smart" they are) there is an aspect of intelligence testing that is rarely mentioned. Intelligence, as measured by modern science, is a function of age. If a ten-year-old, say, answers  half of all the questions on the test correctly, his or her age will be a factor in converting  this "raw" score into an "intelligence quotient", or "IQ". If a twenty-year-old answers in precisely the same way, with the same number of correct answers, his or her "IQ" will not be the same as the ten-year-old's.  Assuming that testing for something styled innate intelligence, having nothing to do with education, is a reasonable thing to do, using age as a factor must be reasonable as well.
     It does, however, mean that our grandparents were right--that you should "learn something new every day"--otherwise your score on an IQ test would actually be lower as you age. If you got the same "raw" score at age forty as you did at age twenty, you would, in fact, be getting dumber.

kosher and halal

     Both Jews and Muslims are subject to dietary laws--an unfamiliar notion to most Christians, or to non-religious people. The Jews call food that is suitable to eat, according to their dietary laws, "kosher". The Muslims call suitable food "halal". Neither Muslims nor Jews eat pork--it is forbidden to them by the same scriptures Christians call the Old Testament. When you see a sign or a food label package that says "kosher" or "halal", it means that a religious authority has checked that the food does not violate any dietary guidelines--including how the animal was slaughtered, and what might be present in the plant where it was processed. For instance, a Jew or Muslim would not want to eat chicken that was prepared where pork was also prepared.
    For many Jews and Muslims, this means avoiding many popular fast-food places, since pork is served in them.  For people who are not Jews or Muslims, "kosher" or "halal" on a package of hot-dogs or sausage may simply mean "all-beef".

what is a gleaner?

     The word "gleaner" is being used lately to denote something that remains mysterious--partly because the people using the word don't seem to know what it means. The origin of its new popularity is assumed to be the Biblical injunction against interfering with the gleaners-- but the intentions and identity of the sect or cult teaching this remain obscure.
    No matter. "Gleaner" has a meaning. A "gleaner" came along after fields were harvested and picked through the rows of cut stalks for any grain that might remain. In some societies it was considered to be the least that anyone could do for the poor--to permit them to gather what had fallen on the ground when grain was harvested.

baby blue eyes

     Another in a list of things that not everyone knows--and we too frequently assume that they do. This one began with a baby picture of my daughter, showing her pretty blue eyes.  My daughter has dark brown eyes like mine. Someone looking at the baby picture might think that it was a picture of a different baby--no, it was a picture of my daughter. All Caucasian babies are born with blue eyes. At six months to a year old, their eyes turn brown, if they are going to be brown-eyed adults. If a family has both blue and brown-eyed people in it, they have to wait that long to find out what the baby will look like--whether its eyes will be blue or brown. Babies with green eyes ( which are uncommon) are born with green eyes. My daughter's eyes, at first a light blue, turned a brilliant turquoise, then a very deep blue before they turned brown--at about six months.

children of Ham

     At least one religious or quasi-religious group has a Biblical explanation for racial inequality. They claim that it is ordained by the quotation " the children of Ham shall serve the sons of Noah", or words to that effect. What's missing is that Ham was one of the sons of Noah--he had three of them.
     By the way, the internet makes it easy to look for the source of a quotation--just type it into the search box--and you can read it in its original context.

with age, anything becomes venerable

   In our Academy of Natural Sciences, here in Philadelphia, you can see, along with dinosaur bones, wonderful old taxidermy and pretty rocks, an exhibit of coprolite--which means, well, dinosaur poop.  I suppose anything that gets old enough winds up in a museum.

The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog.

     "The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog" is a famous quotation that sounds silly, until you find out why it is so famous. It uses every letter of the alphabet at least once--so when someone was learning to set type, years ago, or wanted to test a typewriter with a key for each letter, he or she only had to type that sentence. It was useful when learning to type, as well. It may still be useful to people who want to check on code they have written for new fonts. Or, you might try texting it.