No new ESPN content this week other than Klawchat; I’ve been working on my top 50 free agents ranking, which goes up some time after the World Series ends, and there’s a 2015 draft ranking in the editing queue up in Bristol.

Lots of links this week…

• Isaac Asimov was my favorite writer when I was a kid; I devoured his Foundation series, and taught myself algebra from his now out-of-print Realm of Algebra book, which is probably still sitting in the library of my junior high school. MIT Technology Review has a previously unpublished essay he wrote in 1959, asking how people get new ideas.
• A delightful BBC News piece commemorating what would have been the 100th birthday of mathematician, writer, and puzzle-master Martin Gardner, including ten puzzles for you to tackle.
• Last week’s Saturday five included some links to stories about the #GamerGate imbroglio, and reader Liz F sent along another story, from TechCrunch, that tries to look at the story as two separate controversies under one banner.
• From a Rwandan Dump to the Halls of Harvard. Of course, the headline could have just said “Harvard,” but “the Halls of Harvard” sounds so much more Norse-mythological.
• Via Richard Deitsch on Twitter, a powerful post from writer Jeff Benedict on getting his sister out of an abusive marriage. Not for the faint of heart.
• Economist Paul Krugman takes aim at Amazon’s monopsony in e-book retailing. I sort of agree, and I sort of disagree. It’s a complicated question because there’s not much evidence Amazon is harming consumers, which is usually the standard for evaluating anticompetitive practices.
• Vegas Watch summarized my perplexing Twitter conversation with RJ Bell, where I couldn’t seem to get an answer to my question about whether record against the spread (ATS) has any predictive value. (It doesn’t.)
• Biochemist and food writer (and frequent Good Eats guest star) Shirley Corriher talks food science with NPR’s The Salt.
• The Verge looks at how crappy “satire” sites are spreading Ebola panic. Read it if only to learn what sites you should blacklist from your own posts.
• And finally, a very clever commercial, from Finland, that spoofs the country’s tradition of death-metal artists to sell … well, you’ll see.

My second Arizona Fall League scouting post went up earlier this week, and I held my regular Klawchat on Thursday.

My review of this year’s Spiel des Jahres winner, the boardgame Camel Up, is up at Paste magazine. I’ll have three more reviews up for them over the next month or so, and my annual boardgame rankings post will go up here on the dish in mid-November.

Now, for the links – and there are a lot this week:

• The “reanalysis” of MMR data has been retracted. That’s the study that purported to show that African-American boys who received the MMR (measles, mumps, rubella) vaccine at certain ages were more likely to develop autism. The whole thing was a fraud, and now the journal that let this junk slip the through the cracks has admitted its error.
• Speaking of anti-science, in Italy, several seismologists went on trial for failing to predict a massive earthquake that killed 297 people. This was the best long-form piece I saw this week, from the new online-only publication Matter.
• In South Carolina, prosecutors are arguing that “stand your ground” doesn’t apply to victims of domestic violence .
• I’ve been reading more about #GamerGate, the twin scandals that involve harassment of several prominent women in video game development and an attack on conflicts of interest in game reviews. Rawstory published a piece arguing GamerGate is an attack on ethical journalism, while Forbes argues that it’s really a consumer movement. For some more background on the harassment angle, the New Yorker had a great piece in early September on the hate campaign against Zoë Quinn, which set off the whole movement.
• Guy writes chilling post about being a stalker. He seems to think he’s done nothing wrong, which is the most disturbing part.
• A breast-cancer survivor explains why she doesn’t breastfeed – and why it’s rude to ask. My wife couldn’t breastfeed our daughter because of a medication she was taking that shows up in mothers’ breast milk. But really, it’s none of your business.
• A study in the journal Addiction shows results of a twenty-year study into marijuana use, arguing that pot is addictive and has harmful long-term effects. This seems like an argument for education, not for opposing decriminalization.
• The Atlantic posted an amusing/serious piece on how technology is enabling adultery and suspicious partners alike.
• Doctors Without Borders gives a no-bull update on the fight against Ebola in west Africa. All this promised aid hasn’t gotten to the group yet, and they’re also dealing with a smaller outbreak in central Africa at the same time.

My Tuesday column this past week announced that Kris Bryant is my 2014 Prospect of the Year, a piece in which I mentioned a dozen other guys, including the player with the best pro debut by a 2014 draft pick. I also held my regular Klawchat on Thursday.

I’ve been stepping up the boardgame reviews again, reviewing Valley of the Kings for Paste magazine, and Seasons and Spyrium here.

EDIT: Codito/Sage Board Games have a new iOS boardgame app bundle, which takes $1 off each of the games you haven’t bought. Tigris & Euphrates and Le Havre are both excellent, if you don’t already own them.

And now, to the links – seven this time, since I didn’t post last Saturday and had a few extras saved up:

• The most important link I’ve ever posted, I think: Leslie Morgan Steiner on why domestic violence victims don’t leave. She’s a survivor herself, and what she says will help educate people who ask this question.
• From the BBC World Service, an interview with one of the biologists who sequenced the coffee genome. That was part of a program, which you can download directly here, that also included a segment on aquaponics efforts in London and NFL cheerleaders fighting for better wages.
• From Salon, “Finally, Wall Street Gets Put on Trial.” But is that really what the case here means? Will it have any lasting effect – hell, is there even any reason to think this ruling will extend beyond this one court?
• From the NY Times, What we’re afraid to say about Ebola. I don’t know – I think people are rather duly freaked out by the whole thing, including the very scenario the author outlines.
• From Vice, We Should All Be Eating Animal Fat. This won’t convince any vegans, but he makes the case that carnivores shouldn’t be shy when it comes to the fat of the animals we eat. And yes, I do render and use fat from much of the meat I cook – both pork and poultry fats.
• From NPR, on the pleasure of bitter flavors, with a recipe for turnip ice cream.
• I tweeted this last night, but it’s worth repeating – a high school in Bucks County, PA, suspended the school paper’s student editor and faculty advisor because they refused to print the school’s team nickname, the same racist term the NFL team in Washington clings to in the face of mounting scorn and criticism. What a great way to teach kids about censorship and vulgar displays of power.

I wrote about the potential impact of some September callups for Insider, and held a Klawchat on Friday. I’m back on Baseball Tonight in the small hours this evening, with the show airing at 2:30 am Eastern.

This week’s links, from food science to gender bias in sports fanbases:

• The secrets of fake flavors. “Natural” flavors aren’t always what you think they are.
• How municipalities in St. Louis County, Mo., profit from poverty. A very long read that’s worth every word. It’s the new racism, which seems a lot like the old racism’s poll taxes and voter tests.
• Bud and Miller Are Trying to Hijack Craft Beer—and It’s Totally Backfiring. Reminds me of the day I learned Blue Moon was just Coors with different labeling. Screw that.
• Dr. James Andrews wants your young athlete to stay healthy by playing less. Story is over a year old, but more people are willing to hear the message due to the rash of elbow surgeries.
• Female hockey fandom and the good ol’ boys’ club. I guess it’s bias week here on the dish. I don’t think any male sport’s fan base or media contingent is particularly friendly to women.

Also, for fellow fans of melodic death metal, the upcoming In Flames album, Siren Charms, is available as a $5 pre-order through that link. I’m not that familiar with their work, but if anyone’s heard the new album, I’d love to hear your opinions.

It’s been a light week for me at ESPN, by design, but I did write one follow-up draft post about which teams drafted their new #1 prospects, and conducted a Klawchat on Thursday. If you missed my draft recaps, you can find my AL and NL posts from last week.

I’ll be at Lakewood tonight for their game against Hickory, and at the Carolina-California Leagues’ All-star Game here in Wilmington on Tuesday, the 17th.

If you live in the area, I’m going to be a “guest bartender” at a charity event at Ulysses Gastropub in north Wilmington, at the intersection of Marsh Road and Silverside, on June 26th. More details to follow as I get them.

And now the links…

• Learning a second language can slow brain aging. Das ist sehr gut, ja?
• Dow Chemical is pushing to expand use of a 2,4-D, a potentially harmful herbicide. They want to sell crops genetically modified to resist 2,4-D, then have farmers use more of the herbicide to kill weeds – but this approach just creates stronger weeds and the development of even more dangerous chemicals to fight them.
• Doctors used a DNA test to identify an illness, the first time this method had been used successfully to treat a patient with an unknown pathogen.
• The FDA is at it again, overregulating the American cheese-making industry.
• Score one for consumers, though: SCOTUS ruled that POM can pursue its lawsuit against Coca-Cola. POM alleges that Coca-Cola misled consumers by labelled a drink as “blueberry-pomegranate juice” even though those two ingredients constitute just 0.5% of the total product.

My content from ESPN.com this week:

* My second attempt to project this year’s first round. I’ll do another one on Tuesday, and a final one the morning of the draft.
* An updated ranking of the top 25 prospects in the minors.
* This week’s Klawchat.

And this week’s links:

• PETA is trying to scam people into thinking there’s a link between dairy consumption and autism. Actual science tip: There isn’t.
• Some actual good news in the fight against antibiotic-resistant bacteria. And we need some good news there, because the alternative is seriously scary shit.
• I know it went viral a bit yesterday, but if you haven’t seen this story about a five-year-old transgendered boy, it’s well worth the seven minutes. That child is lucky to have parents who realized nothing else mattered but taking care of his needs – and that this wasn’t something they could or should try to change.
• Why is giving kids healthy school lunch options a political issue? I know the answer, by the way (it starts with the letter $). But it’s still disgusting.
• Also from NPR, why bacon smells so good, explained via chemistry. That’s important research right there, people.

Finally, the highlight response from my Twitter arguments with a couple of creationists, most of whom trotted out the same tired and very wrong arguments against evolution, was this doozy (and please don’t go on Twitter and harass the poster):

@keithlaw nope. Also worth noting that I don't believe in carbon dating because Bible says atmosphere functioned differently before Flood.

— Andy Black (@IrvingAg13) May 28, 2014

Carbon dating is just another godless conspiracy, I guess.