It was the most important debate of its time, maybe of all time. It single-handedly changed the world and led to a “war” of monumental importance. So, what was this debate of ideas? The Lincoln-Douglas Debate? The Scopes Monkey Trial? No…it was the Socialist Economic Calculation Debate led by the esteemed Ludwig von Mises. Ludwig…
In 1887, L.L. Zamenhof published Unua Libro in which he detailed a new language of his own creation. His goal was to have this language, since dubbed Esperanto, go global, fostering peace and international understanding in the process. Obviously, he didn’t succeed, at least not yet. But how popular is Esperanto today? The Invention of…
In 1997, Garry Kasparov, perhaps the greatest chess player of all time, squared off against the IBM supercomputer Deep Blue. This epic rematch has since been called “the most spectacular chess event in history.” Who won this “Man vs. Machine” battle? Deep Blue versus Garry Kasparov: Round 1? With two six-month exceptions, Garry Kasparov was…
10,000 years ago, a giant meteorite plunged to the earth, smashing its way into Savissivik, Greenland. In 1895, famed Arctic explorer Robert Peary trekked across the icy expanse and laid eyes on the 31-metric ton slab of iron. The three year struggle that followed would go down as one of the greatest “man vs. nature” battles…
Edgar Allan Poe is one of America’s best known writers. He was well-known for his heart-rending mysteries and is considered the inventor of the detective novel. But Poe is known for something else…two ciphers that eluded all efforts to solve them for over 150 years. What was the Poe Code? Edgar Allan Poe’s Cryptographic Challenge…
On December 6, 1865, America officially abolished slavery with the adoption of the 13th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. However, some people, known as Thirteeners, believe that this was actually the 14th Amendment. The real 13th Amendment, they argue, has been erroneously removed from existence. What is the Lost Titles of Nobility Amendment? The Titles…
The “Wild West” is an expression used to refer to life in the western United States during the late 1800s. For decades, films and books have depicted the Wild West as a place of gunfights, outlaws, and mass disorder. But recent scholarship shows otherwise. It turns out that the Wild West may not have been…
History, we are often told, controls the future. One common refrain is that “those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it.” But which history? Do “actions speak louder than words?” Or is “the pen mightier than the sword?” What are the lessons of history? Do such lessons even exist? Control the…