Sunday, June 10, 2012

The Browser daily newsletter [10 June 2012]

10 June 2012

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Best of the Moment

What Would Augustine Do?

David Luban | Boston Review | 6 June 2012

On President Obama, drones and just war theory. We're told he personally approves targets and is a student of Augustine and Thomas Aquinas. So do the arguments of these Christian writers support the morality of Obama's actions? Comments

America's Last Prisoner Of War

Michael Hastings | Rolling Stone | 7 June 2012

Three years ago, a 23-year-old American soldier walked off his base in Afghanistan and into the hands of the Taliban. Now he’s a crucial pawn in negotiations to end the war. But not everyone, Taliban or American, wants to do a deal Comments

Of Flying Cars And The Declining Rate Of Profit

David Graeber | Baffler | 4 June 2012

Futurologists thought we would have flying cars, force-fields, tractor beams, teleportation, antigravity sleds, immortality drugs and space colonies. But the only technologies to have advanced since the 1970s are those of simulation Comments

Brother Number One

Shadi Hamid | Foreign Policy | 7 June 2012

Who is Mohamed Morsi, the man from the Muslim Brotherhood eyeing Egypt's presidency? He's a 9/11 conspiracy theorist who views US society with apparent contempt. He also references "The Deer Hunter" and has two American children Comments

Odyssey And The Lost Spanish Treasure

Susan Berfield | Businessweek | 7 June 2012

Odyssey Marine Exploration is an American deep-sea treasure hunting company. It recently lost a legal battle over a haul of silver coins recovered from a Spanish wreck. But Odyssey's boss is unworried. More, much more, is to come Comments

Russia's Grandest Master

Anonymous | World Policy Institute | 5 June 2012

Conversation with Garry Kasparov, on chess, politics, Putin. In chess there are fixed rules and uncertain outcomes. In Russian politics, opposite is true: "The outcome is known before, and the rules can change at any time" Comments

FiveBooks Interview

Humphrey Davies on Egyptian Writing

Leading Arabic-English literary translator, who has lived in Cairo for the past 35 years, paints a picture of contemporary Egypt through words and graphic narratives

Featured Special Report

Consciousness

What is it? Where did it come from? How can we learn more about it? Here's a quick look at what we do and don't know about consciousness

Reader Recommendations

@polit2k RT @tim_weber: Give Greece a chance, say tourist business owners t.co/DGQMAvlq Great feature #browsings #greece #austerity

Book of the Day

Before I Go To Sleep by SJ Watson

Tess Gerritsen says: “This is a domestic thriller, by a man writing from a female point of view. He had me convinced from the first paragraph”

Video of the Day

Your Eyes Are Stupid

Optical illusions deconstructed by ZeFrank

Quote of the Day

Venkatesh Rao, on technology

"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from nature"