Ananda Jayce header 1500

welcoming jayce hunter messenger to this whole world (om-dot-diddit)

ON NO­VEMBER 18, 2016, my won­drous daughter Ananda gave birth to my first grand­child, Jayce Hunter Mes­senger. Daughter and grand­child are doing well, as is new daddy Jamison Mes­senger. I waited a few weeks to post these photos as I wanted to give J.H. some time to re­cu­perate from the transition.

Jayce is a Scorpio. [Read more] “welcoming jayce hunter messenger to this whole world (om-dot-diddit)”

introduction to neal umphred dot com

RA­TI­O­CI­NA­TIONS OUT OF THIN AIR was the title that I wanted for this blog. But it would have been con­fusing as most people don’t know what “ra­ti­o­ci­na­tion” means and few would bother to look it up. So we’re stuck with my name with “dot com” tacked on and this is the in­tro­duc­tion to that blog. [Read more] “introduction to neal umphred dot com”

carl sagan on our need for skepticism every day

WE HAVE ARRANGED A SO­CIETY based on sci­ence and tech­nology, in which no­body un­der­stands any­thing about sci­ence and tech­nology. And this com­bustable mix­ture of ig­no­rance and power, sooner or later, is gonna blow up in our faces. 

If we are not able to ask skep­tical questions—to in­ter­ro­gate those who tell us that some­thing is true, to be skep­tical of those in authority—then we are up for grabs for the next charlatan—political or religious—who comes am­bling along. [Read more] “carl sagan on our need for skepticism every day”

JimiHendrix smoking 1500

but I’d never ever seen anything like that before!

SEEING SOME­THING NEW and dif­ferent and un­ex­pected and then re­marking upon it—no matter what it is!—is not racism, prej­u­dice, big­otry, etc. It’s just we do when we see some­thing that we haven’t ever seen any­thing like it be­fore! So this piece is about a few anom­alies that have stuck in my head for more than forty years—because I haven’t seen them du­pli­cated since! [Read more] “but I’d never ever seen anything like that before!”

Benghazi USbuilding photo 1500

it’s our job to figure out what happened in benghazi!

EVERY­WHERE I TURN—whether  in con­ver­sa­tion, on in emails with my Re­pub­lican con­tacts, and es­pe­cially on Face­book and the other so­cial media on the internet—I hear people “quoting” then Sec­re­tary of State Hillary Clinton on what hap­pened to the ef­fect that she said that the deaths in Beng­hazi “didn’t matter” or “doesn’t matter.” [Read more] “it’s our job to figure out what happened in benghazi!”