An irregular exploration of the struggle between the power of rational discourse and the scientific method on one hand, and the forces of superstition and dogma on the other.
James Hrynyshyn is a freelance science journalist based in western North Carolina, where he tries to put degrees in marine biology and journalism to good use.
The Demon-Haunted World:
Science as a Candle
in the Dark,
by Carl Sagan
(A
review)
The Doubter's Companion:
by John Ralston Saul (Excerpts)
Skeptic Magazine: www.skeptic.com
Committee for the Scientific Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal: www.csicop.org
A poem by Yehuda Amichai:
The
Place
Where We Are Right
The Meaning of the
Island of Doubt
By doubting we come to inquiry; and through inquiry we perceive truth.
--- Peter Abelard
Undisguised clarity is easily mistaken for arrogance.
-- Richard Dawkins
As for evolution, it happened. Deal with it.
-- Michael Shermer.
May 16, 2008
Category: climate
Is putting real money on something as consequential as a computer model of climate trends consistent with the professional detachment that's supposed to accompany honest research?
Posted by James Hrynyshyn at 3:46 PM • 2 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
May 15, 2008
Category: climate
This is all angels-on-pinhead philosophy. The real question is, would are the real consequences of an ESA listing?
Posted by James Hrynyshyn at 9:27 AM • 3 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
May 14, 2008
Category: climate
Word is the U.S. Interior Department, after much delay, is going to list the polar bear (Ursus maritimus) "as a threatened species because of declining Arctic sea ice," according to major news service alert. Marvelous. Now all we have to...
Posted by James Hrynyshyn at 2:41 PM • 2 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
May 13, 2008
Category: religiosity
There are basically two kinds of news consumers. Those who will find David Brooks' latest creation from his corner of the New York Times stable of columnists absolutely irresistible and those who will cross the street to Fox News before...
Posted by James Hrynyshyn at 2:50 PM • 15 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: climate
The free market is no more capable of reorganizing the industrial engines of civilization — which is what an effective response to the climate crisis will require — than is McDonald's capable of supplying a healthy diet to the billions and billions it serves.
Posted by James Hrynyshyn at 11:44 AM • 2 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
May 12, 2008
Category: climate
Fewer than half of those who aren't embarrassed enough by the current president's record to hide their party affiliation believe the bloody obvious.
Posted by James Hrynyshyn at 5:02 PM • 11 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
May 5, 2008
Category: climate
Got the Monday blues? Then find five minutes to brighten your day by playing what I call spot-the-slander on the Heartland Institute's list of "500 Scientists Whose Research Contradicts Man-Made Global Warming." The rules are simple:...
Posted by James Hrynyshyn at 10:06 AM • 5 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Everything Marine
In a rare treat on the usually quiet and contemplative Island of Doubt, I now bring you the 12th edition of the Carnival of the Blue, a celebration of all things wet and wonderful. Islands are only islands, after all,...
Posted by James Hrynyshyn at 6:30 AM • 0 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
May 3, 2008
Category: politics
Only Americans, and, because this Clinton campaign stop was in a rural corner of the state, only small-town Americans, can be trusted to do what's right.
Posted by James Hrynyshyn at 8:14 AM • 3 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
May 1, 2008
Category: climate
Climatologists probably need to take a stiff drink before they open the papers (or fire up their web browsers) the morning after their studies appear in print or online. Two if the studies involved say anything interesting about global warming....
Posted by James Hrynyshyn at 8:51 AM • 10 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: cetacea
Funny, I didn't know one needed a marine biology degree to work in the White House.
Posted by James Hrynyshyn at 6:53 AM • 7 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
