Scott McLemee's"Violence and the Sacred," Inside Higher Ed, 28 July, looks at the work of French Catholic theorist, Rene Girard.

If there's a misnamed history blog, it's eb's no great matter. eb has a keen eye for great matter and is complaining that history bloggers are largely missing in an important discussion about Jared Diamond's Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fate of Human Society. The most salient posts seem to be at SavageMinds (and here), Brad DeLong, Crooked Timber, debitage, Elfin Ethicist and tak at Frog in a Well.
Update: At Crooked Timber, Henry Farrell takes tak to the woodshed. See also: Kevin Drum at Political Animal.

There's another important conversation going on about grade inflation. See: Harry Brighouse,"Is Grade Inflation Real?" Crooked Timber, 26 July; and Janice McCabe and Brian Powell,"Woebegone About Grade Inflation," Inside Higher Ed, 27 July. Both pieces raise questions about our sense that grade inflation is real and important.

Arianna Huffington,"Judy Miller: Do We Want to Know Everything or Don't We?" Huffington Post, 27 July. Arianna puts the pieces together in the puzzling Plame inquiry. Thanks to Josh Marshall for the tip.

Our colleague, Nathanael Robinson, is blogging up a storm on"Tristan and the Sites of German Memory": Part I, Part II, and Part III.

Where is Rob MacDougall? The Japanese have developed an android. She's known as Repliee Q1. I could be wrong, but those don't look like the hands of a woman to me.

Perhaps you heard the story on NPR. On 25 July, the New York Times set a record by correcting the 12 year old obituary of William G. McLoughlin with this note:

An obituary on Jan. 6, 1993, about William G. McLoughlin, an emeritus professor of history and religion at Brown University, misstated the date and cause of his death. Professor McLoughlin died on Dec. 28, 1992, not on Jan. 4, 1993; the cause was colon cancer, not liver cancer. The article also misstated the location of his World War II military service. It was at Fort Sill, Okla., not in Europe. The Times learned of the errors through a recent e-mail message from a family member.

It's good to have the record corrected. He was a fine historian.