January 3, 2009
This is the ONLY documentary I've ever seen that tells it like it really is in the natural world.
Fuck Planet Earthby Nyxem
January 3, 2009
And the worst case scenario is that this lead could drop by far less then necessary to turn the race around.
Everyone assumes that the loser, in this case Coleman, will file a law suit. It would fit with how the game has been played so far. But what would such a law suit do? It is not the case…
January 3, 2009
Or perhaps just the scariest... Game Show In My Head.
(Chances are this has been on TV for years and I've never noticed it, but we just happened to watch it tonight. Not that we ever watch TV ... we just happened to bump into the TV and it turned on and stuff.)
Have you seen it?
January 2, 2009
As a daughter, I was raised to know nothing about money. Whenever I tried to ask my father a question on the subject he would respond, "Nu, Daphne? Since when the interest in business?" and shoo me away.
... apropos our discussion here, read about Bernie Madoff -> here
ty Ana
January 2, 2009
Scientists monitoring at Mount Moreland - South Africa's largest Barn Swallow Hirundo rustica roost - have captured their first overseas ringed bird from a festively snowy location. The young Barn Swallow had flown all the way from Finland - a total of 11,000 km! "This is an amazing Christmas gift…
January 2, 2009
A French warship has intercepted two suspected pirate boats in the Gulf of Aden and arrested eight Somalis on board, the French navy says.
International naval patrols are credited with helping deter most recent hijack attempts off Somalia, with only two ships captured last month.
But pirates still…
January 2, 2009
I live in Minnesota, and our team is the Vikings. So I know something about losing, and from this perspective, I can explain to you what Norm Coleman is doing.
First, the context. Tomorrow, Saturday, the canvassing board will open and count absentee ballots and add that to the mix. As I…
January 2, 2009
With the increased seismic activity in the Yellowstone Caldera, it is likely that there is some increased interest in in the geology of the area. Here are some resources that should be of interest.
First, we have a fairly recent peer reviewed publication on the "Super Volcano" known as Yellowstone…
January 2, 2009
Abundant tiny particles of diamond dust exist in sediments dating to 12,900 years ago at six North American sites, adding strong evidence for Earth's impact with a rare swarm of carbon-and-water-rich comets or carbonaceous chondrites, reports a nine-member scientific team.
story here
January 1, 2009
You have already heard that there has been increased seismic activity at Yellowstone National Park over the last few days. Since December 26th, there have been several earthquakes a day, some jut over 3.0 magnitude, in the vicinity of the north side of Yellowstone's lake. This is a seismically…
January 1, 2009
Oldest American man dies at 112
America's oldest man, an African-American who befriended Louis Armstrong and voted for president-elect Barack Obama "because he's black," has died in Sacramento, California, his family said.
January 1, 2009
There's 20 songs in there. From djearworm.
January 1, 2009
The current situation is this: We are waiting for a final decision next week on the outcome of the race, and most likely this outcome will start numerically with Franken's current 49 vote lead and be adjusted by the addition of several hundred absentee ballots. The exact number of these ballots…
January 1, 2009
The best soccer team on the planet has just over a 1 in four chance of winning the world cup even it it makes it to the last stages of the season. I suppose this is because they play for, like, four hours and each side gets, like, zero or one points. So it's kinda like being really really good at…
January 1, 2009
I do not have the vaguest clue what a Microsoft Zune is, but there are reports that they are all crapping out roughly at the same time for unknown reasons. Microsoft technical support is on vacation, so apparently they don't know about it. Details can be found here.
It is a good thing it is…
December 31, 2008
New Year Resolutions
~ Resolution Number One ~
No Empty Promises!
~ Resolution Number Two ~
ACTIVITY TERMINATED
...
December 31, 2008
Naturalism is a potential source of guidance for our behavior, morals, ethics, and other more mundane decisions such as how to build an airplane and what to eat for breakfast.1 When it comes to airplanes, you'd better be a servant to the rules of nature or the airplane will go splat. When it…
December 31, 2008
... So, if you drive the boat downstream past the hippos they watch you go by, the big male feints attack a few times, you get past them, and everybody gets over it. Up ahead, the next pod of hippos has observed this, and they are waiting for your arrival....
Read the rest.
December 30, 2008
Who?
Yes, the Who too!
So, I'm watching a bit of the Kennedy Center's annual super duper awards. Morgan Freeman won an award. Did you know he was discovered as the driver in Driving Miss Daisy, though he had a long and undistinguished career before that? Did you know that B.B. King has gotten…
December 30, 2008
From the BBC:
Wildlife officials in Australia are investigating how an alligator native to North America was found wandering around a campsite in New South Wales.
Campers at the site in Pambula managed to snare the beast in a volleyball net and held its jaws shut.
Police first issued a press…
December 30, 2008
... and other matters.
The following list represents widely held beliefs, either first order beliefs (things you hear people say) or second order beliefs (things implied directly by what people say):
Evolution is very slow.
It takes millions of years for a species to evolve into another species.…
December 30, 2008
Obamadog. Barack Obama's first serious mistake since the election.
A true story starring Franklin Delano Roosevelt.
December 30, 2008
The next few days will be the most interesting, potentially, in the Franken Coleman recount.
Notice that I do not use any words like "Debacle, Fiasco, Circus, Swampmire" and so on when speaking of the recount. This is because this is a democratic (as in America! The Greatest Democracy in the…
December 30, 2008
Without distinctions and boundaries, the race concept cannot apply to a given species. Species with observable geographical differences in one or more traits may be better described as having clinal variation. Without correlation among traits, the race concept has none of its usual utility, whereby…
December 29, 2008
The Bush Anti-Patriot Act and its paper minions across the states is nothing less than the undoing of the fundamentals of American freedom. Ironically, this has been done with the collusion of the poorly educated Libertarian and Rightist supporters of the conservative movement, who really, honestly…
December 29, 2008
...I notice the door man take a quick glance up the street and subtly drop his smoke out of sight next to the stairs. He steps half way onto the sidewalk. Sure enough, Baronelli himself is coming down Hanover, walking his dog ... a tiny frenetic brown thing ... leash in one hand and an unlit cigar…
December 28, 2008
Why was this post so popular? Scantily clad athletes? Hair raising death denying stunts? Incredible writing and a fascinating story? People googling the Olympics a lot? We'll never know.
December 28, 2008
I'm not mentioning any names, and don't ask me any details. In fact, don't repeat this story.
Some years ago, when I was a mere graduate student, a fellow student working in an unnamed country in Africa discovered a very very old stone artifact. To this day, this bit of chipped stone debris,…
December 27, 2008
To me, the key moment in CrackerGate was the posting by PZ Myers of the key, essential truth of it all: The same church law that mandated the sacredness of the Eucharist also mandated that Jews would always wear a mark indicating their Jewishness. The latter eventually lead to the holocaust, as…
December 27, 2008
Many of my posts related to the Webster Cook Affair received a great deal of attention. In fact, the blogospheric activities related to the PZ Myers CrackerGate showed up as a noticeable bump in the internet and blew out a couple of those Middle Easter cables that are always breaking. This post…
