March 10, 2011
What happened in #Wisconsin, and what happens next by Laura Conway:
Last night, Wisconsin State Senate Republicans stripped most public employees unions of most collective bargaining rights. After insisting for weeks that busting the unions was essential to balancing the state's budget, they broke…
March 10, 2011
Senate Bill 1854, introduced in the Florida Senate on March 5, 2011, would, if enacted, amend a section of Florida law to require "[a] thorough presentation and critical analysis of the scientific theory of evolution" in the state's public schools. The bill is sponsored by Stephen R. Wise (R-…
March 9, 2011
"Disingenuous efforts by creationists to portray themselves as persecuted in mainstream academia for their anti-evolution beliefs are getting a boost from a Texas lawmaker," reported the Texas Freedom Network in a March 9, 2011, post on its blog. House Bill 2454, introduced in the Texas House of…
March 9, 2011
Apparently, they voted without the Dems present. Oh hell, who needs teachers and stuff anyway.
March 9, 2011
You may have noticed that Scienceblogs.com has been loading slowly lately. Also, in the "back end" .... where we write the blogs and stuff ... the servers have been slow, and eventually, useless. Well, the crack technical team that takes care of these things have determined that we were…
March 9, 2011
I did not have a chance to write about the Anthropology fracas that erupted several weeks ago, and I probably won't for a while. But Jamie Jones did.
When I met him Jamie was a grad student in the Anthro department at the small eastern college I got my PhD at. He and I taught together and got…
March 9, 2011
I'm reminded of Boobquake because of this
Obligatory photograph related to Boobquake:
Photograph from "A Fatwa on Purdah"
When boobquake happened, I checked the USGS for earthquakes and found, if memory serves, a quake of about 7.0 magnitude. Such quakes happen just over once a month, so that…
March 8, 2011
The video comes from Project Veritas, and is another in political activist James O'Keefe's undercover exposes (he most prominently took on ACORN -- the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now). In the video, Schiller and NPR institutional giving director Betsy Liley are at lunch in…
March 8, 2011
From the IWD web site:
International Women's Day (8 March) is a global day celebrating the economic, political and social achievements of women past, present and future. In some places like China, Russia, Vietnam and Bulgaria, International Women's Day is a national holiday.
I remember in the…
March 8, 2011
Courtney Martin examines the perennially loaded word "feminism" in this personal and heartfelt talk. She talks through the three essential paradoxes of her generation's quest to define the term for themselves.
March 8, 2011
These masses of ice are now contributing more new meltwater to the world's seas than all other melting ice combined.
The Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets are losing mass at an accelerating pace, according to a new NASA-funded satellite study. The findings of the study -- the longest to date of…
March 8, 2011
Jen McCreight writes the blog Blag Hag and became famous last year for attempting unsuccessfully to prove that if a large number of women wore low cut shirts there would be a major earthquake. (It turns out that there was a 7-point-something earthquake on "Boob Quake" day, which requires that the…
March 6, 2011
And historical exploration, from DOS to Seven
"Daddy, what's a floppy drive?"
March 5, 2011
The other day, Julia and I decided to install SimCity 4 Deluxe for Windows on one of our Linux boxes. Using Wine, the install went fine, but the program would not run. It would kind of start up but then die with no obvious explanation. With a bit of work I can probably find the reason and fix it…
March 5, 2011
Because we say so.
March 4, 2011
You do know that other people can read your thoughts, right? (What? I can see by what you are thinking that no one told you! Oh dear.)
Did you also know that Dark Matter is really just the sides of the jar that someone keeps our universe in? If you've ever worked with certain kinds of computer…
March 4, 2011
Or worse. Below the fold. Not work safe. Don't be holding the kitty or you might squeeze it by accident:
UPDATE: My friend Aseem points out that this is the original on which the little christian kids base their song:
March 4, 2011
So, a while ago, Ben Zvanwas talking about doing something with the Bible, which would involve processing the text through some filters and recompiling it. This sort of thing has always interested me: Not recompiling the bible, but rather, textual analysis in general using the basic material…
March 4, 2011
I've always felt that if Wally the Wanker came back with his old, stupid and obnoxious trick, that I would out him. He came back. I considered outing him but have been quite distracted with important things like changing diapers and feeding tiny bits of chicken to Huxley. Meanwhile, blogger…
March 4, 2011
Read more at Sociological Images.
March 4, 2011
Because he's a moron and a corporate shill! He's perfect! Watch:
March 3, 2011
(In reference to Want)
March 3, 2011
Follow Blake Freeman as he takes 69 year old Leroy, across the country on a hilarious journey for the truth about Aliens, Psychics and the Paranormal.
March 3, 2011
s a second subcommittee hearing on Tennessee's House Bill 368 approaches, the author of The Evolution Controversy in America and the executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Tennessee are speaking out against the bill....
Details at the NCSE
March 3, 2011
Please spread this video around.
March 3, 2011
Or, on some other bridge or other flat spot next to a major body of water...
Global Water Dances -- June 25, 2011 @ Yahoo! Video
Global Water Dances is a world event planned for June 25, 2011. On this day, a 24 hour series of dances around the globe will be danced, centered around water issues.…
March 3, 2011
Hateful people. Stupid people. The "I don't even care if you think I'm crazy any more" kind of person.
OMFG. I am sorry, fellow humans, who happen to be Muslim.
Reminds me of this.
March 3, 2011
Skeptically Speaking on Friday will be: Brain Games with Tom Stafford, who co-wrote Mind Hacks: Tips & Tricks for Using Your Brain. Friday evening. Details here!
Also, "Dr. Sarah Brosnan explains her study of game theory, and how humans compare to other primates when it comes to cooperative…
March 2, 2011
Mental maps are interesting. I recently heard about reserch being done at the University of Minnesota in which it can be shown that rats develop a mental map of a maze, then later, when faced with moments of decision, pause in real space to run through alternative routes of the map in their heads…
