I always feel a certain sense of reverence in libraries, even small city ones that smell like homeless internet users.

Arthur Jay Klinghoffer, a professor of political science at Rutgers University, has argued that geography seems less relevant than ever in a world where nonstate actors -- malleable entities like ethnicities, for example -- are as powerful and important as the ones with governments and borders. Where on a map can you point to al-Qaeda? Or Google, or Wal-Mart? Everywhere and nowhere.

Eratosthenes, the mapmaker who was the first man to accurately measure the size of the Earth, was a librarian.

When you make a decision you need facts. If those facts are in your brain, they're at your fingertips. If they're all in Google somewhere you may not make the right decision on the spur of the moment.

People are using GPS systems to find millions of little hidden objects throughout the world - often as simple as a piece of Tupperware hidden in the woods. You go to a website, you get the latitude and longitude to get the specific location of a certain specific hiding space, and then you go there and see if you can find it.

I always feel a certain sense of reverence in libraries, even small city ones that smell like homeless internet users.

As Jeopardy devotees know, if you're trying to win on the show, the buzzer is all. On any given night, nearly all the contestants know nearly all the answers, so it's just a matter of who masters buzzer rhythm the best.