Actual frost on frostweed

While frostweed (Verbesina virginica) is remarkable for the delicate ice it extrudes from its stalk when the temperature drops to freezing, the plant isn’t immune from having actual frost settle on it. I reconfirmed that on December 12th in Great Hills Park when I went down there for my annual documenting of frostweed’s ice trick. The top picture shows frost on some frostweed flowers that had lingered into mid-December, thanks to unusually mild temperatures. The portrait below shows frost on an already dry and curled frostweed leaf.

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I’m reading Steven Pinker’s new book Rationality: What It Is, Why It Seems Scarce, Why It Matters. At one point he cites figures from Bobby Duffy’s Why We’re Wrong About Nearly Everything. You can find out if you’re right or wrong about the following things by saying what percent of the American population you estimate each of these groups represents. (The percents in other countries would be different, of course.)

• Immigrants.
• Gays.
• African-Americans.
• Jews.

And for this last one, the scope is worldwide:

• Girls and women aged 15–19 who give birth each year.

To allow people time to see this and come up with estimates, I’ll provide the answers two or three posts from now.

© 2021 Steven Schwartzman