Open Thread for Dr. Carl's Students

Get this: Dr. Walter Carl of Northeastern U. has actually asked his students to read SPSII. He wrote me to say they'll be discussing it in class today, so I thought it'd be cool to create an open thread for them to post comments. Please feel free to opine on any aspect of the essay. I'm all ears!

Of course, the irony here is that when I was in school, I barely did the assigned reading, much less the extra stuff. Luckily, being an art major, I was able to avoid having to think too much, which was beneficial since I was busy killing off brain cells anyway....