Archives for June, 2009
Canadian Dinosaur Find: New Species?
Posted by Greg Laden on June 30, 2009 The best of last June The first dinosaur bones (that we know of) to have been discovered in British Columbia, Canada, are now being reported. These are bones found in 1971, eventually making their way to the Royal British Columbia Museum, and now being reported by V.M. Arbour and M.C. Graves. The bones were initially…
Help Al Franken One More Time!!!!
Posted by Greg Laden on June 30, 2009 I just got an email from my close personal friend, Al Franken. Here’s part of it (I cut out the personal smushy stuff): I’ve said it before, and I want to say it again: THANK YOU. We just received word that the Minnesota State Supreme Court has ruled on Norm Coleman’s appeal. I wanted to…
FDA: Limits on Acetaminophen
Posted by Greg Laden on June 30, 2009 Acetaminophen dose recommendations will be lowered significantly by the FDA, and some products will be pulled off the market, because of concerns over liver damage. If you look up “Tylenol” on Wikipedia as I write this, you see the following: Indeed. From MSNBC: Despite years of educational campaigns and other federal actions, acetaminophen remains the…
Swine Flu Edumavideo for Kids
Posted by Greg Laden on June 30, 2009 Hat Tip It’s Alive
Palm Pre v. iPhone 3Gs v. 3G v. speed tests
Posted by Greg Laden on June 30, 2009 Powerup: 3G by a mile, Palm Pre pwnd Browsing: Palm Pre wins, 3Gs slowest Real World Test: 3Gs broke, Palm Pre wins.
Coleman Steps Aside: Franken is Senator
Posted by Greg Laden on June 30, 2009 Seconds ago, Norm Coleman announced that he concedes the election to Al Franken. He just called Al a minute ago, and stepped out side his home to thank everyone and make the announcement. It is over.
Franken Wins Court Battle, Unclear if Pawlenty will Sign
Posted by Greg Laden on June 30, 2009 UPDATE: COLEMAN CONCEDES The Minnesota Supreme Court has rejected a legal challenge by Norm Coleman, thereby leaving the vote count determined by an election contest judicial panel placing Franken in the lead standing. The basis of the Coleman legal challenge is was essentially that all abentee votes shoudl be counted no matter what, because they…
Franken Wins Election to Senate!
Posted by Greg Laden on June 30, 2009 After nearly eight months, Al Franken has won the election to the United States Senate. There are indications that Pawlenty will sign the election certificate. I’ll update shortly as soon as I have more information. UPDATE HERE UPDATE UPDATE: COLEMAN CONCEDES
What is the meaning of life?
Posted by Greg Laden on June 30, 2009 Science steps in and looks at the processes of nature and shows us how to tease apart the secrets of their workings, slowly and carefully and with missteps along the way. The missteps are readily acknowledged and re-examined. The successes are retested to make sure they closely approximate (within a high confidence interval) the truth.…
Blogospherics
Posted by Greg Laden on June 30, 2009 Some interesting things for you to red between now and my next post, which will be on lions. Is there a tamiflu resistant strain of the swine flu? Effect Measure discussed this. Bora and PZ are at a conference and they’re blogging it. Here and here. Carnival of Space is here
The Science of Lion Prides
Posted by Greg Laden on June 30, 2009 Although the paper addresses Tanzanian lions, this is a photograph of a Namibian lion Starting some years ago, we began to hear about revisions of the standard models of lion behavioral biology coming out of Craig Packer’s research in the Serengeti. One of the most startling findings, first shown (if memory serves) as part of…
The Future of Science Journalism
Posted by Greg Laden on June 30, 2009 Nature has a special … special thingie … on science journalism. It appears to be more or less open access so even you, a virtual nobody from the perspective of the pirate publishing companies, can actually see it. There are commentaries and articles on blogs and twitter, on the future of science journalism, and so…
I didn’t say it. And when I said it I shouldnta said it.
Posted by Greg Laden on June 30, 2009 And I’m still sayin’ it, and I’m going to continue to deny I’m sayin’ it, and I’m going to keep sayin’ it, and Joe the Plumber, the liberals, I was trapped, they gotta do their job and vet the liberal views in congress, and that’s that’s what I was getting at…. Apparently, the following video…
Biology Will Never Be the Same Again: Scott Lanyon
Posted by Greg Laden on June 29, 2009 The best of last June Note: Since writing this post a year ago, at the time of Scott’s talk, I learned something interesting that I think it is OK to share with you. Prior to the talk, Scott has received an injury, which was causing him considerable pain during the talk itself. He left from…
How to be more keyboardy: Update
Posted by Greg Laden on June 29, 2009 Being more keyboardy is good. The mouse is good, too. But if you can do more things with the keyboard, those things will usually happen faster and with less mucking around. Also, it is very, very cool to sit there and go “tap tap tap” and have stuff happen on the screen without the mouse.…
B-GIRL BE: Fourth International Multimedia Festival
Posted by Greg Laden on June 29, 2009 Intermedia Arts Presents B-GIRL BE :: A CELEBRATION OF WOMEN IN HIP-HOP :: Fourth International Multimedia Festival Summer Camps — August 11 – 14, 2009 Mama Said Knock U Out! Exhibition — August 27 through October 23, 2009 Dance Performances — September 17 – 20, 2009 B-Girl Be Block Party– Saturday, September 19, 2009 art…
Primate Diaries: New Scienceblogs.com Blogger E.M. Johnson
Posted by Greg Laden on June 29, 2009 Eric Michael Johnson has a Bachelors degree in Anthropology and a Masters in Evolutionary Anthropology. He pursued his PhD in Evolutionary Anthropology at Duke University before joining the University of British Columbia to complete a doctorate in the History and Philosophy of Science. And he now blogs here.
Hiaasen For Kids
Posted by Greg Laden on June 29, 2009 I very recently reviewed Carl Hiaasen’s novels. Among his fiction are two books that are written explicitly for kids. Looking just at Hiaasen’s titles it may be hard to pick them out from the pack, so I’m making a special reference to them here. They are called “Hoot” and “Flush.” Details follow:
New Photoblogger at Scienceblogs.com
Posted by Greg Laden on June 29, 2009 Following the excellent round of rocket photography by Steve Jurvetson, we now come down to earth with minerals photographed by B. Jefferson Bolender.
David Carter essay on the Stonewall Uprising.
Posted by Greg Laden on June 29, 2009 If you don’t know what the Sontewall Uprising is, and you are interested in Gay Rights, then click here and be edumicated.
Racist bomber in the dock at Old Bailey
Posted by Greg Laden on June 29, 2009 A racist arrested by chance at a railway station was “on the cusp” of waging a terror campaign using tennis balls and weedkiller, a jury has heard. Neil Lewington, 43, had a bomb factory at his parents’ home in Reading, Berks, and wanted to target those he thought “non-British”, prosecutors alleged. The Old Bailey heard…
Flu Update: Millionth American Case, Scams, Prospects
Posted by Greg Laden on June 29, 2009 The novel swine flu has affected its one millionth American. The first death in England has been recorded (a 9 year old girl). Yesterday, the first Brazilian death was recorded. When we look at the map of the disease, note that many regions of Africa are totally devoid of cases. Just so you know ……
Skepchickcon is this weekend!
Posted by Greg Laden on June 29, 2009 Skepchickcon is a Track at Convergence 2009. Convergence 2009 is one of those science fiction conventions where everyone dresses up as Klingons and such. I’ve never been to one but I’ve sure seen plenty of them on TV and in the movies. Skepchickcon is a “Track,” which means it is a series of panels and…
Pawlenty Vague on Signing Franken Into Senate
Posted by Greg Laden on June 29, 2009 Time Pawlenty has become famous for his ability to be extraordinarily vague. Now we are seeing this in relation to the expected Minnesota State Supreme Court decision on the Franken-Coleman Senate election contest. For the most part, Pawlenty has signaled that he will only sign the election certificate if he is instructed to do so…
What really happened on the moon
Posted by Greg Laden on June 29, 2009 I have no comment on this. Gotta go … helicopter coming.
Son of Mike Invades Tokyo
Posted by Greg Laden on June 29, 2009 Bing, son of blogger and politico Mike Haubrich, has just arrived in Japan where he will spend several months assisting in a linguistic research project in the Greater Tokyo Metro area. And hopefully getting around the country a bit to see some cool stuff. He’s got a web site tracking his trip here. Please note…
Lost Moon Tapes Found in Perth Australia
Posted by Greg Laden on June 29, 2009 UPDATE: grrrrrrrrrr….. The original story, now retracted, is below the fold. Somebody is dicking around on the internet. It is possible that the Daily Express article is a “hoax” or a “fiction” … at least, this is what some are claiming. See the updates here on Bad Astronomy. I’m not sure if I would use…
Death of an Historic Notable
Posted by Greg Laden on June 29, 2009 On this day in 1885, Thomas Henry Huxley died at the age of 70. He is most famous for his sideburns, but in addition he was also involved with the study of evolution and the defense of Darwinism. He also invented the term Agnostic. Which he was. T.H. Huxley, Darwin’s Bulldog
Happy Birthday FreeDOS
Posted by Greg Laden on June 28, 2009 DOS stands for Disk Operating System. In the old days it was how you ran your PC. You booted up the computer and you had a prompt much like today’s Linux command line in appearance. If you typed “wp” at the command line, a text-based non-GUI version of WordPerfect would run. If you typed “dir”…
Questions about Missionaries
Posted by Greg Laden on June 28, 2009 As you know, there has been quite a bit of discussion about missionaries in the Congo on this blog. This is the central post pointing to everything else, and at Minnesota Atheists you’ll find a link to today’s radio show on the topic. It turns out that a number of calls and emails did come…
, which is now available for the 
