Well, I think of the folks who are the climate deniers as the flat Earthers and the people who say the moon landings never happened.

There's plenty to read about keeping your sanity while raising children, but it's all common-sense stuff about task division and taking breaks and the relentlessly repeated magic of date night with your spouse. What's missing is some 'tude.

It's one of the worst-kept secrets of family life that all parents have a preferred son or daughter, and the rules for acknowledging it are the same everywhere: The favored kids recognize their status and keep quiet about it - the better to preserve the good thing they've got going and to keep their siblings off their back.

Overspending is as certain a part of the holiday season as overeating. But pushing away from both the table and the cash register at least a little bit sooner can make the post-holiday hangover hurt a little bit less.

Science has yet to isolate the Godiva Chocolate or Prada gene, but that doesn't mean your weakness for pricey swag isn't woven into your DNA. According to a new study of identical twins, it's less TV ads or Labor Day sales that make you buy the things you do than the tastes and temperaments that are already part of you at birth.

Well, I think of the folks who are the climate deniers as the flat Earthers and the people who say the moon landings never happened.

It's not mere extremism that makes folks at the fringes so troubling; it's extremism wedded to false beliefs. Humans have long been dupes, easily gulled by rumors and flat-out lies.