Technology in the News Today
Born on this Day in History: June 21, 1905 - French novelist, playwright, and leading exponent of Existentialism, Jean-Paul Sartre's philosophies continues to influence the fields sociology, critical theory and literary studies. Beginning with the book Nausea in 1949, he was eventually awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1964, but he declined it. He had a long polyamorous relationship with social theorist Simone de Beauvoir.
On this Day in History: June 21, 1982 - John W. Hinckley, Jr., who on March 30, 1981, shot President Ronald Reagan and three others outside a Washington, D.C., hotel, was found not guilty of attempted murder by reason of insanity. In the trial, Hinckley's defense attorneys argued that their client was ill with narcissistic personality disorder, citing medical evidence, and had a pathological obsession with the 1976 film Taxi Driver, in which the main character attempts to assassinate a fictional senator. His lawyers claimed that Hinckley had watched the movie more than a dozen times, was obsessed with the lead actress, Jodie Foster, and had attempted to reenact the events of the film in his own life. The movie, not Hinckley, they successfully argued, was the actual planning force behind the events that occurred on March 30, 1981.