Pure Evil Versus Applied Evil

The new SMBC is brilliant! I love the caption: "Most of the time when people call something pure evil, they're actually talking about applied evil." ;)

"Batkid"

The Batkid story is really cool! It's nice to see something like this. (Seriously. Take a look at the link.)

(Tip of the cap to Zach Rosenfield for suggesting a googling of "Batkid" on Facebook.)

Update: OK, this story has gotten even cooler! In fact, it is now particularly awesome, as the US Justice Department is now playing along in a very cool way. As you can see, "The Riddler" and "The Penguin" have surely done some hideous crimes, though I think that their attempt to convert Lou Seal into a Los Angeles Dodgers fan is not only forgivable but even laudable, and I would therefore encourage the Justice Department to give them leniency because of that redeeming bit of behavior amidst what were otherwise heinous crimes. (Another hat tip to Zach for the link to the Justice Department website above.)

Which Superhero and Supervillain are you?

(Hmmm... my copy-and-paste job gives html that looks horrible. I really don't have the patience to do anything about it beyond acknowledging that it's crap. Anyway, you'll just have to scroll a little more for this entry.)


I'm a sucker for quizzes like this, and I decided that I was curious what superhero I'd be. While I was at it, I saw the supervillain quiz and decided to take that one too. There are unsurprisingly many more superhero and supervillain quizzes available from all corners of the Web. (I know, I know: Those sites probably aren't true corners, though one can actually define a rigorous notion of a corner in a graph---just consider nodes whose edges all have low betweenness centrality.) Let me know if you find any betters ones.

Anyway, here is my result for superheroes:


You are Spider-Man

Spider-Man 70% Hulk 70% Batman 60% Green Lantern 55% Robin 50% Supergirl 35% Superman 25% Iron Man 25% Wonder Woman 20% The Flash 20% Catwoman 20%

You are intelligent, witty, a bit geeky and have great power and responsibility.

Comment: 35% Supergirl? What the fuck? The combination of Spider-Man and Hulk is kind of odd, but I can see it to some degree. I don't follow comics, so I'm sure there are characters out there who would fit better.


Here are my results for supervillain:


You are Mr. Freeze

Mr. Freeze 57% Riddler 53% Dr. Doom 48% Apocalypse 46% The Joker 44% Green Goblin 44% Two-Face 40% Magneto 37% Venom 36% Poison Ivy 36% Lex Luthor 33% Dark Phoenix 31% Catwoman 20% Mystique 20% Juggernaut 12% Kingpin 0%

You are cold and you think everyone else should be also, literally.

Comment: I didn't match particularly well with any of the supervillains, but the choice probably makes reasonable sense. I'm apparently not at all like Kingpin. :)