As a kid, I knew all of the names – Mickey Mantle, Yogi Berra, Joe Dimaggio, Roberto Clemente -the list goes on. My knowledge of professional baseball came from the radio. In 2006, driving across South Dakota, I listened to an interview that epitomized the love of the game.
Edgard Clemente, of the Sioux Falls Canaries, was being interviewed – and he was happy to be able to make a living playing the game he loved. His uncle was Roberto – whose baseball career was much more successful than Edgard’s – but I didn’t know that when I listened to the radio. I was listening to a young man who was overjoyed to be playing baseball, for the Canaries, in Sioux Falls, and was willing to tell everyone in the listening audience just how great it was to have the opportunity to play professional baseball in Sioux Falls.
Over the years, I watched Clemente’s career. He’d started out playing 3 years for the Colorado Rockies, where he hit all of his 8 major league home runs in 1999. He had been a tenth round draft pick. From the Colorado Rockies, he moved to the Anaheim Angels in 2000. In 2005, he played for Puerto Rico in the World Cup – and performed well enough that when I listened to the happy young man, he was on his second year with the Canaries. From the Canaries, he went on to the Somerset Patriots – it was Atlantic League, but he was briefly back in league ball. I’m sure that he felt Sioux Falls was the place that gave him a chance to get back into league ball, even if it was the minors.
In 2010, he played for the Broncos de Reynosa in the Mexican league. The last mention I found as I followed his career was 2012, when he played first for the New Jersey Jackals and ended with the Puebla Pericos (parrots).
His professional baseball career ran from 1993 to 2012. It was rare for Edgard to spend two years with the same team, playing for 23 different teams over his 20 year career. I never saw Edgard Clemente play – but I listened to an interview with a once major league ball player who was happy to be able to continue his career in South Dakota.
How much do you engage with others when you’re out in public? Lots of people don’t actually engage with others much at all. Think of commuters on public transportation staring down at their phones with earbuds firmly in place.
As a professor of social psychology, I see similar trends on my university campus, where students often put on their headphones and start checking their phones before leaving the lecture hall on the way to their next class.
Curating daily experiences in these ways may appeal to your personal interests, but it also limits opportunities for social connection. Humans are social beings: We desire to feel connected to others, and even connecting with strangers can potentially boost our mood.
At the same time, our attention is increasingly being pulled in varied directions within a highly saturated information environment, now commonly known as the “attention economy.”
It is perhaps not surprising, then, that so many Americans are experiencing a crisis of social connection. Research in social psychology helps to explain how the small behaviors and choices we make as individuals affect our experiences with others in public settings.
Where you focus your attention
One factor shaping people’s experiences in public settings concerns where they focus their attention. Since there is more information out in the world than anyone could ever realistically take in, people are driven to conserve their limited mental resources for those things that seem most crucial to navigating the world successfully. What this means is that every person’s attention is finite and selective: By attending to certain bits of information, you necessarily tune out others, whether you’re aware of doing so or not.
More often than not, the information you deem worthy of attention also tends to be self-relevant. That is, people are more likely to engage with information that piques their interest or relates to them in some way, whereas they tend to ignore information that seems unrelated or irrelevant to their existence.
One unfortunate consequence is that a person may end up treating interactions with other people as transactions, with a primary focus on getting one’s own needs met, or one’s own questions answered. A very different approach would involve seeing interactions with others as opportunities for social connection; being willing to expend some additional mental energy to listen to others’ experiences and exchange views on topics of shared interest can serve as a foundation for building social relationships.
It can feel alienating to be surrounded by people who have basically hung out a ‘do not disturb’ sign. Drazen/E+ via Getty Images
How others interpret your actions
Also, by focusing so much attention on their own individual interests, people may inadvertently signal disinterest to others in their social environments.
As an example, imagine how it would feel to be on the receiving end of those daily commuting rituals. You find yourself surrounded by people whose ears are closed off, whose eyes are down and whose attention is elsewhere – and you might start to feel like no one really cares whether you exist or not.
As social creatures, it’s natural for human beings to want to be seen and acknowledged by other people. Small gestures such as eye contact or a smile, even from a stranger, can foster feelings of connection by signaling that our existence matters. Instead, when these signals are absent, a person may come to feel like they don’t matter, or that they’re not worthy of others’ attention.
How to foster connection in public spaces
For all these reasons, it may prove valuable to reflect on how you use your limited mental resources, as a way to be more mindful and purposeful about what and who garner your attention. As I encourage my students to do, people can choose to engage in what I refer to as psychological generosity: You can intentionally redirect some of your attention toward the other people around you and expend mental resources beyond what is absolutely necessary to navigate the social world.
Engaging in psychological generosity doesn’t need to be a heavy lift, nor does it call for any grand gestures. But it will probably take a little more effort beyond the bare minimum it typically takes to get by. In other words, it will likely involve moving from being merely transactional with other people to becoming more relational while navigating interactions with them.
A few simple examples of psychological generosity might include actions such as:
Tuning in by turning off devices. Rather than default to focusing attention on your phone, try turning off its volume or setting it to airplane mode. See if you notice any changes in how you engage with other people in your immediate environment.
Making eye contact and small talk. As historian Timothy Snyder writes, eye contact and small talk are “not just polite” but constitute “part of being a responsible member of society.”
Smiling and greeting someone you don’t know. Take the principle of “innocent until proven guilty” to the realm of social relations, by showing your willingness to welcome other people rather than displaying disinterest and avoidance. Such simple acts may help to foster feelings of belonging and build a sense of community with others.
Acknowledging another human with a smile, even when using an automated system, can help them feel seen and valued. izusek/E+ via Getty Images
Among the most cynical, examples like these may initially be written off as reflecting pleas to practice the random acts of kindness often trumpeted on bumper stickers. Yet acts like these are far from random – they require intention and redirection of your attention toward action, like any new habit you may wish to cultivate.
Practicing acts of psychological generosity, then, can provide you with opportunities to benefit from social connection, at the same time as these acts can pay dividends to other people and to the social fabric of your community.
Mars, one of our closest planetary neighbors, has fascinated people for hundreds of years, partly because it is so similar to Earth. It is about the same size, contains similar rocks and minerals, and is not too much farther out from the Sun.
Because Mars and Earth share so many features, scientists have long wondered whether Mars could have once harbored life. Today, Mars is very cold and dry, with little atmosphere and no liquid water on the surface − traits that make it a hostile environment for life. But some observations suggest that ancient Mars may have been warmer, wetter and more favorable for life.
Even though scientists observing the surface of Mars conclude that it was once warmer than it is today, they haven’t been able to find much concrete evidence for what caused it to be warmer. But a study my colleagues and I published in April 2025 indicates the presence of carbonate minerals on the planet, which could help solve this puzzle.
Carbonate minerals contain carbon dioxide, which, when present in the atmosphere, warms a planet. These minerals suggest that carbon dioxide could have previously existed in the atmosphere in larger quantities and provide exciting new clues about ancient Mars’ environment.
As a geochemist and astrobiologist who has studied Mars for more than 15 years, I am fascinated by Mars’ past and the idea that it could have been habitable.
Ancient carbon cycle on past Mars
Observations of Mars from orbiting satellites and rovers show river channels and dry lakes that suggest the Martian surface once had liquid water. And these instruments have spotted minerals on its surface that scientists can analyze to get an idea of what Mars may have been like in the past.
Today, Mars is very cold, with a thin atmosphere and dry climate. But in the ancient past, it may have been warmer and wetter, with a thicker heat-trapping atmosphere. NASA/J. Bell – Cornell U./M. Wolff – SSI via AP, File
If ancient Mars had liquid water, it would have needed a much warmer climate than it has today. Warmer planets usually have thick atmospheres that trap heat. So, perhaps the Martian atmosphere used to be thicker and composed of heat-trapping carbon dioxide. If Mars did once have a thicker carbon dioxide-containing atmosphere, scientists predict that they’d be able to see traces of that atmospheric carbon dioxide on the surface of Mars today.
Gaseous carbon dioxide dissolves in water, a chemical process that can ultimately contribute to formation of solid minerals at and below the surface of a planet − essentially removing the carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. Lots of scientists have previously tried to find carbonate minerals on the surface of Mars, and part of the excitement about a warmer, wetter early Mars is that it could have been a suitable environment for ancient microbial life.
Finding carbonates on Mars
Previous searches for carbonates on Mars have turned up observations of carbonates in meteorites and at two craters on Mars: Gusev crater and Jezero crater. But there wasn’t enough to explain a warmer past climate on Mars.
The Curiosity rover has detected carbonates on Mars’ surface. NASA
As my colleagues and I detail in our new study about these results, this carbonate mineral could contain some of the missing atmospheric carbon dioxide needed for a warmer, wetter early Mars.
The rover also found iron oxyhydroxide minerals that suggest some of these rocks later dissolved when they encountered water, releasing a portion of their carbon dioxide back into the atmosphere. Although it is very thin, the modern Martian atmosphere is still composed mainly of carbon dioxide.
In other words, these new results provide evidence for an ancient carbon cycle on Mars. Carbon cycles are the processes that transfer carbon dioxide between different reservoirs − such as rocks on the surface and gas in the atmosphere.
Potential habitats for past microbial life on Mars
Scientists generally consider an environment habitable for microbial life if it contains liquid water; nutrients such as carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen, oxygen, phosphorus, sulfur and necessary trace elements; an energy source; and conditions that were not too harsh − not too acidic, too salty or too hot, for example.
Since observations from Gale crater and other locations on Mars show that Mars likely had habitable conditions, could Mars then have hosted life? And if it did, how would researchers be able to tell?
Although microorganisms are too small for the human eye to detect, they can leave evidence of themselves preserved in rocks, sediments and soils. Organic molecules from within these microorganisms are sometimes preserved in rocks and sediments. And some microbes can form minerals or have cells that can form certain shapes. This type of evidence for past life is called a biosignature.
Collecting Mars samples
If Mars has biosignatures on or near the surface, researchers want to know that they have the right tools to detect them.
To that end, the Mars 2020 Perseverance rover has been collecting and sealing samples on Mars, with one cache placed on the surface of Mars and another cache remaining on the rover.
These caches include samples of rock, soil and atmosphere. Their contents can tell researchers about many aspects of the history of Mars, including past volcanic activity, meteorite impacts, streams and lakes, wind and dust storms, and potential past Martian life. If these samples are brought to Earth, scientists could examine them here for signs of ancient life on another planet.
So I see a facebook posting that lists Murphy’s Law as ‘the more you fear something, the more likely it is to occur.’ Would have been a surprise to Murphy, who said “If anything can go wrong, it will.” Sam sent me another AI generated theme that claimed “No person, no problem” came from the film The Lion King.
Pretty sure that phrase came from the great Soviet philosopher Joe Stalin. Heck, Uncle Joe left us photos to prove it:
The problem I’m seeing with artificial intelligence is that, while AI can quickly review the literature, it lacks the ability to separate bad data from good. I’m not seeing announcements on AI making discoveries that alter our understanding of physics. I am seeing where high school students and undergraduates are using AI as a way to plagiarize papers.
It’s a fast way to do a literature review – and that’s essentially what a high school term paper is. The problem is discernment. The cop instructor at TSJC and I were about the same age. He had completed a cohort based master’s in public administration – I had a research bachelor’s in Sociology and had then gone back in Ag Engineering. He started a doctorate (pretty much correspondence) from Nova – and was shocked to learn that including the Encyclopedia Britannica in your sources wasn’t acceptable in a Ph.D. program. His master’s degree was one of those termed a “terminal degree” – meaning that it wasn’t meant to prepare him for a doctoral program.
And that seems to be the weakness of AI programs – they can definitely read faster than I can, and condense the information – but AI (so far) doesn’t have the ability to sort out the bull. The spot where AI scares me is that students will use it, rely on it, and not have the ability to discern bad research, bad assumptions, from good. I can see where AI has great potential for speeding research – but I remember my own dissertation, where a single conversation with one old Hutterite minister disproved my hypothesis. When I knew what I was looking for, I could find the data – but without that conversation I would have published bad research.
My belief is that AI can develop some very sloppy research habits in students – and it will probably be more damaging in my own area of social sciences than it will in quantum physics.
In case anyone was wondering how many children are attending our local schools, we have some answers: ANB, which is a measurement of enrolled students, is done twice per school year, and is what determines a significant component of school funding. It is also publicly available on the OPI’s website.
Overall, total enrollment between Trego, Fortine, Eureka, Yak, McCormick and Libby holds relatively steady, though we can see a distinct drop associated with Fall of 2020-Spring 2021.
We can look a little closer at Trego, Yak and McCormick. Why those three? All three are so small that they do not have an administrator, and instead have that role filled by the county superintendent.
In that comparison, we can see that Yak typically runs the lowest of the three, and that all three experience fairly frequent and significant fluctuations.
Comparing the elementary schools in North Lincoln County involves looking at Fortine, Eureka and Trego enrollments. Overall, we see a slight increase in K-8 enrollments in North county, though they’ve been steady for the past few years. We additionally notice that the Fall 2020 enrollment drop occurred mostly in Eureka.
We can also look at each school individually. First, Trego:
We’ve looked at Trego’s trendline in previous years: Historical School Enrollment, so a longer term trend-line is available. What we see is that Trego Elementary is facing a long-term trend of lowering enrollment.
Fortine: From the ANB Data available, it’s not apparent if the drop that shows represents a trend or not. Fortine has experienced a drop in enrollment over the period we’re looking at.
Eureka: Shows an increase over the time we’re looking at. It doesn’t line up perfectly with the enrollment changes in Trego and Fortine, which implies that there’s something else going on as well (population changes, or fluctuations in homeschool rates likely also contribute).
Yak: Experiences massive enrollment fluctuations. A longer period of data would be necessary to determine a trend. School enrollment in the Yak has been quite low at times.
McCormick: Enrollment Fluctuates significantly, enough that it’s probably a continual budget concern, but it doesn’t necessarily indicate a downward trend. More data needed, but the years we have hold a fairly stable average.
Libby: Not as steady as Eureka, but probably also impacted by different demographic factors.
Last week, we asked the question: Is it normal for school district transportation budgets to be constant from year to year? Looking again at the school budgets (public information- available for download here), we’ll check Trego’s transportation budget against Fortine and Olney-Bissell.
Trego
Fortine
Olney-Bissell
24/25
$40,000
$100,000
$212,343.85
23/24
$49,000
$110,000
$182,153.42
22/23
$49,000
$100,000
$178,610.31
21/22
$49,000
$79,000
$148,389.48
20/21
$49,000
$79,000
$142,509.61
19/20
$39,600
$79,000
$136,007.52
18/19
$56,500
$77,000
$128,707.28
17/18
$54,000
$77,000
$132,116.37
16/17
$48,925
$77,000
$123,648.45
15/16
$48,925
$79,000
$121,413.44
Looking through the numbers- my first response is: That’s really weird. Olney-Bissell shows a steady increase over the last decade. Inflation being a thing that exists, that makes sense. Trego and Fortine fluctuate, but not a whole lot. For those of us that like graphs:
There are really two factors to be considered in the costs associated with transportation: Mileage, and time (paying the bus drivers). Both of these are going to be related to number of students and district size.
We can absolutely get an approximate number of students- from the same file, even. It’ll be an approximate (ANB funding will usually be based on the three year average, though it might also be the current year, depending on changes in enrollment). The mileage, well, that’s going to be more interesting to find.
For the moment, we can observe that a recent increase in Fortine’s transportation budget seems to coincide with lowered enrollment.
Meanwhile, the transportation budget in Trego doesn’t seem to have been connected to enrollment at all.
Trego's Mountain Ear 