![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.conversiondiary.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/09\/7_quick_takes_sm1.jpg\" "\\"7_quick_takes_sm\\"")
<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a>\u2014 1 \u2014<\/strong><\/p>\n Jen Fulwiler of Conversion Diary (who runs this blog carnival) was in the hospital yesterday with two pulmonary embolisms, and treatment is complicated, since she\u2019s pregnant. \u00a0Happily, she was discharged last night and is stable enough to be treated\/monitored at home. \u00a0If you\u2019re part of the religious subset of readers for the blog, please keep her in your prayers.<\/p>\n And, if you\u2019re looking for someone to pray\u00a0to<\/em>, Jen keeps a random saint generator running<\/a>, so you can learn more about the saints and possibly take one of them on for the year to get to know better. \u00a0I got St. John Neumann<\/a> to watch over my first calendar year as a Catholic. \u00a0(His feast day is tomorrow).<\/p>\n <\/a>\u2014 2 \u2014<\/strong><\/p>\n I\u2019m glad Jen is doing better, but it\u2019s been a frightening week, so let me cheer you all up with one of the cutest proposals I\u2019ve ever seen<\/a>:<\/p>\n It\u2019s precisely cut DNA run through gel electrophoresis<\/a>! \u00a0Awwwww.<\/p>\n <\/a>\u2014 3 \u2014<\/strong><\/p>\n The next link comes to you via my brother, who has learned that I tend to only be interested in sports when there are puns (a la roller derby), abuses to oppose (football) or math, and he sent me a fascinating story from Grantland on \u201cThe Kobe Assist<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n Although the smartest basketball analysts evaluate success by possessions, for the most part the temporal extent of basketball analysis remains too narrow. Anyone who has ever acknowledged that the \u201cassist\u201d has some value has therefore admitted that basketball outcomes exhibit sensitive dependence on the events immediately preceding them. But this concept goes well beyond passing, is central to basketball strategy, and is part of what separates basketball from other games we love to measure. Baseball analytics had its epiphany in part because Bill James and others realized that baseball was only barely a team sport, and really could be reduced to a discrete sequence of outcomes that involved singular players competing in sequences of one-on-one scenarios. But basketball achievements do not occur in a vacuum; just as it is rare for one player to be solely responsible for a made basket, it is similarly rare for one player to be solely responsible for other types of events, including rebounds and put-backs.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n <\/a>\u2014 4 \u2014<\/strong><\/p>\n Everyone I know has been sending round the\u00a0New Yorker<\/em> profile of Apollo Robbins, the theatrical pickpocket<\/a>. but it really is so good I can\u2019t resist sharing in case any of you haven\u2019t seen it. \u00a0This part is amazing:<\/p>\n A few years ago, at a Las Vegas convention for magicians, Penn Jillette, of the act Penn and Teller, was introduced to a soft-spoken young man named Apollo Robbins, who has a reputation as a pickpocket of almost supernatural ability. Jillette, who ranks pickpockets, he says, \u201ca few notches below hypnotists on the show-biz totem pole,\u201d was holding court at a table of colleagues, and he asked Robbins for a demonstration, ready to be unimpressed.<\/p>\n Robbins demurred, claiming that he felt uncomfortable working in front of other magicians. He pointed out that, since Jillette was wearing only shorts and a sports shirt, he wouldn\u2019t have much to work with.<\/p>\n \u201cCome on,\u201d Jillette said. \u201cSteal something from me.\u201d<\/p>\n Again, Robbins begged off, but he offered to do a trick instead. He instructed Jillette to place a ring that he was wearing on a piece of paper and trace its outline with a pen. By now, a small crowd had gathered. Jillette removed his ring, put it down on the paper, unclipped a pen from his shirt, and leaned forward, preparing to draw. After a moment, he froze and looked up. His face was pale.<\/p>\n \u201cFuck. You,\u201d he said, and slumped into a chair.<\/p>\n Robbins held up a thin, cylindrical object: the cartridge from Jillette\u2019s pen.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n But what I loved best is when Robbins talked about how he taught himself thieving and mentioned he drew on aikido and ballroom dance. When he demonstrates one technique on the reporter, I recognized the seed of the move from aikido class and a way to get into shadow position in rumba. \u00a0Huzzah!<\/p>\n <\/a>\u2014 5 \u2014<\/strong><\/p>\n Earlier this week, when I was reviewing a book about Mormonism<\/a>, Michael H, a practising Mormon and a college friend of mine did yeoman\u2019s work in the comment threads \u2014 answering questions, talking about his experience, and always raising the tone of the conversation. \u00a0He has a blog of his own, and all y\u2019all may be interested in his recent post on what he makes of the secrecy of certain rituals in his faith<\/a>.<\/p>\n However, the LSAT and other standardized tests demonstrate that there are circumstances in the non-Mormon world with secrets as closely and zealously guarded as the verbiage of the Mormon temple ordinances \u2013 perhaps even more so, for the questions change for each test, whereas temple ordinances seldom change and have been published far and wide on the internet. Maybe some of the reasons for the parallel norms of secrecy are similar: the significance of the LSAT and similar tests lies in the presumption that the candidates are encountering those specific questions for the first time. Though they could be informed of the format of the exam, the types of questions they could find, and strategies for interacting with the questions that they will eventually be required to answer, if they had seen their particular test booklet previously, the resulting experience would be fundamentally altered. It is requisite to encounter the test at the right place, at the right time, and in the right manner, or it loses much of its purpose. For this reason strict secrecy is implemented thereafter: test administrators wish to prevent those who have taken the test from corrupting others\u2019 experience. While us veterans can speak in generalities because we understand the implications of specific words (\u201cUgh, three<\/em> logical reasoning sections?\u201d or \u201cWhat about that question with Iturbe, Hong, and Franco?\u201d), we are enjoined to say nothing more.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n <\/a>\u2014 6 \u2014<\/strong><\/p>\n Via Statistical Modeling, Causal Inference, and Social Science, a map of isolines of travel distances to various parts of the US in 1857<\/a>. \u00a0The mapmakers back then assumed you were setting out from NYC, natch.<\/p>\n <\/a>\u2014 7 \u2014<\/strong><\/p>\n Also, I just want to remind you to get in contact with me if you think you might be interested in joining the February Math & Theology bookclub\/guestblogging extravaganza<\/a>. \u00a0So far, eleven of you folks have told me you\u2019re getting the book and want in. \u00a0Don\u2019t forget to comment or email me if you want in!<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n