I wrote about the opening of the World Science Festival 2009 and Edward O. Wilson's 80th birthday at the Lincoln Center in New York City but he was not the only august personage in attendance.  Present to give tribute to him was also molecular biologist, Nobel laureate and co-discoverer of the structure of DNA, James Watson.

From 1958 to 1970 Wladimiro Dorigo, my father, directed a political and cultural magazine called "Questitalia" ("This italy"), where emerging political issues were discussed, and the ongoing transformations of Italian society were dissected by a distinguished group of intellectuals. I own a copy of all the 150 issues of that publication, and every once in a while I pick one of them out of the lot at random, and learn what Italy was 40 or 50 years ago.

With school budgets already sub-par, and the purse strings futher tightened in this current economic state, teachers have to find ways to do more with less. One suggestion, if I may, is to combine chemistry and history. Checking off the list of U.S. presidents while also teaching children about the periodic table is a great way to kill two birds with one stone, and who knows, it may even help retention of each subject.

(I use U.S. presidents as one example; you could easily apply the venerable Table to a whole host of subjects.) 

Let's start easy.

The premise behind the pokerbot is simple: there are many, many bad players in online, low-limit poker games, and thus by playing a tight, mistake-free strategy, you will win over time. Unfortunately, because the worst players are in low-limit games and because Joe from Topeka takes his allotted thirty seconds every time he’s confronted with a $0.05 raise, you might make a better hourly wage mowing lawns, flipping burgers, or participating in medical trials, even if you play multiple tables at once (see earlier blog "Internet Poker: By the Numbers").

Enter the pokerbot: instead of doing the drudgery of playing mechanical, low-limit poker yourself, why not use a program to do it for you—better yet, use many programs each taking in a little money at a time.