Archives for June, 2008
Nellie McKay: “Clonie”
Posted by Greg Laden on June 27, 2008 Singer-songwriter Nellie McKay performs the semi-serious song “Clonie” — about creating the ultimate companion.
Lemur Scent and Kin
Posted by Greg Laden on June 27, 2008 Perhaps judging a man by his cologne isn’t as superficial as it seems. Duke University researchers, using sophisticated machinery to analyze hundreds of chemical components in a ringtailed lemur’s distinctive scent, have found that individual males are not only advertising their fitness for fatherhood, but also a bit about their family tree as well. “We…
Science News
Posted by Greg Laden on June 27, 2008 How the Snake Got Its Vertebrae Snakes, fish, chickens, and humans all begin life in much the same way. Early in their transformation from an amorphous blob of cells into a fully developed animal, growing cells pinch off into a string of identical segments destined to become individual vertebrae, which will later sprout blood vessels,…
Anthropology Carnival
Posted by Greg Laden on June 27, 2008 Four Stone Hearth, the Lard Edition is here, at Paddy K Swedish Extravaganza. Four Stone Hearth is a blog carnival covering all of anthropology. The home page for Four Stone Hearth is here.. I want to get you excited about this blog carnival, because I am hosting it next time around, for the July 2…
Going to China? What are your health risks?
Posted by Greg Laden on June 27, 2008 According to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) dog bites and respiratory illness are among the top concerns for travellers to china.
Software for your iPod Touch
Posted by Greg Laden on June 27, 2008 An x-ray I took of Julia’s hand. Sorry, it’s a little blurry. The main two functions of an iPod touch are: being an iPod (music, podcasts, movies, etc.) and giving you a pocket size web browser. There are several other functions as well, like a calendar and such. Here I want to review a couple…
Bill Gates: WTF, man?
Posted by Greg Laden on June 27, 2008 Is this some kind of sick joke? Do you remember when Bill Gates retired from Microsoft? There was even a YouTube video about it: That was, like, six months ago. So why do we see this reported on the BBC web site:
So mike did come by
Posted by Greg Laden on June 27, 2008 to get is phone. He even brought some muscle. Some tough looking guy. He tried to claim the fish was his, of course. He was like “Yea, I had that in my pocket. I was gonna eat it later” and shit. But I didn’t even listen ’cause I remembered it from last month, not making…
The Perfect Bird Family Tree…
Posted by Greg Laden on June 26, 2008 … is certainly still in the future. But we have seen a step in that direction in a new paper, coming out this week in Science. This research applies intensive and extensive genomic analysis to the avian phylogenetic tree. The results are interesting. This paper is summarized in a number of locations, most notably here…
Atheist Talk Radio and Minneapolis Gay Pride Guy Wayne Besen
Posted by Greg Laden on June 26, 2008 Minnesota Atheists’ “Atheists Talk” radio show Sunday, June 29, 2008, 9-10 a.m. Central Time In honor of Minneapolis Gay Pride, Wayne Besen of Truth Wins Out discusses “Exposing ‘Ex-gay’ Ministries” and Jane Bowman of Project 515 discusses “515 Minnesota Laws that Discriminate Against Gays.” “Atheists Talk” airs live on AM 950 KTNF in the Minneapolis/St.…
Pile On
Posted by Greg Laden on June 26, 2008 Join Zuska and her commenters in a pile on regarding the Smithsonian Magazine’s recent article on the archaeology of southern Africa. It’s racist, it’s sexist, and it’s even anti-Neanderthal. (The article, not Zuska’s post) Regarding the writing about the use of stone tool technology in the article: It says, “could be women – but no…
Harvard Medical Labcast
Posted by Greg Laden on June 26, 2008 Harvard has a new podcast called Harvard Medical Labcast, Science that’s Changing your World. It’s pretty good, and you can find it here. If you want the latest Linux podcast managing client, check this out.
Cool on the Intertubes
Posted by Greg Laden on June 26, 2008 Please have a look at the latest I and the Bird (Number 78) blog carnival, located HERE at It’s Just Me. Also, PLoS has published a number of avian biology papers lately, all of which I want to read and eventually will (at least some of them). But for one of them, there is a…
Growing Up, and The Process of Discovery
Posted by Greg Laden on June 26, 2008 This is not a time to be profound. This is a time to rehydrate and make some more coffee. And search around for stuff that fell out of pockets.
Blog Carnival
Posted by Greg Laden on June 26, 2008 The Tangled Bank # 108 is HERE at Wheat-Dogg’s World.
Some Nature and Science News
Posted by Greg Laden on June 25, 2008 NASA warming scientist: ‘This is the last chance’ from PhysOrg.com (AP) — Exactly 20 years after warning America about global warming, a top NASA scientist said the situation has gotten so bad that the world’s only hope is drastic action. [...] Some searchers still expect to see rare woodpecker from PhysOrg.com (AP) — For the…
Jennifer assures us we will not be sucked into a tiny black hole later this month.
Posted by Greg Laden on June 25, 2008 Given the limited and limiting nature of the discussion of the Large Hadron Collider firing up in a very short time, which could then destroy this corner of the solar system according to some, I have been hoping that blogger Jennifer Ouellette would chime in and make sense of it all. And she certainly has…
How about a little rational thought for dinner?
Posted by Greg Laden on June 25, 2008 I’m going to a blogers’ dinner tonight, so I thought it would be fun to point to a couple/few items on the internet that have to do with Rational Thought. To kind of offset what is likely to happen when too many bloggers get into one actual real place. First, check out these two items…
Optical Character Recognition in Linux
Posted by Greg Laden on June 25, 2008 I don’t think Optical Character Recognition (OCR) works that well, frankly. But it can be done and it can be better than retyping piles of text. It does seem to work nicely when the text is nice and clean on nice clean white paper with a good contract between ink and background and no garbage…
Alert: Atheist To Appear on Christian Talk Radio Show Today
Posted by Greg Laden on June 25, 2008 August Berkshire, head of the Minnesota Atheists, will be on AM 980 KKMS today (June 25th 2008) at 3:30. August Berkshire, President of Minnesota Atheists will discuss his experience of visiting Jeff’s church last Sunday. Hey, do you think August had a religious experience and converted? Tune in to find out!!! I quickly add: The…
Evolution Fight in Texas School Board Expected Shortly
Posted by Greg Laden on June 25, 2008 This summer, in fact. Don McLeroy, dentist and chair of the Texas School board (a state-wide elected body) is a creationist. Of evolution, he says “I just don’t think it’s true or it’s ever happened.” The 15 member board is stocked with seven creationists. It could have been worse, but the outcome of recent elections…
The Gallup Creationism Index Continues to Flatline
Posted by Greg Laden on June 25, 2008 Click here for the full post by Gallup. Far more Democrats believe in evolution than do those pesky Republicans. Interestingly, the configuration for “independents” looks just like the configuration for Democrats, not Republicans.
The funniest thing you will see on the internet today ….
Posted by Greg Laden on June 25, 2008 … perhaps this week … is …
The blogger’s birthday
Posted by Greg Laden on June 24, 2008 I want to explain about birthdays and bloggers. This is going to take a couple of minutes. Blogging is a new kind of social phenomenon generally speaking, and it is still very new to me. So much of it remains to be worked out. I have to say, in this regard, I ‘ve been watching…
Sex Ratio Bias in India
Posted by Greg Laden on June 24, 2008 Sometimes boys are worth more, sometimes girls are worth more. In an evolutionary sense. Or, more correctly, the value of a certain sex … as an offspring … can be measured in fitness terms. Fisher noted this and hypothesized this was the explanation for the 50-50 sex ratio we usually see. As one sex becomes…
The Earth Will Not Be Sucked Into A Black Hole. But it may coexist with a large number of tiny black holes until the end of time as we know it
Posted by Greg Laden on June 24, 2008 An utterly incomprehensible paper has been produced by a team of physicists, designed to make everyone feel better about the possibility that the Large Hadron Collider will produce black holes that will suck the Earth into themselves. There is no effort whatsoever in this paper to speak to normal people. The most I can get…
, which is now available for the 
