June 26, 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 it home from the…
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…
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…
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.
I normally do not blog very many day to day details of my private life, especially regarding other people, because it is obnoxious to know someone who…
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.
These results are mirrored, as usual, by the differential…
June 25, 2008
... perhaps this week ... is ...
here.
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.…
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…
June 24, 2008
We anthropologists love this stuff. This is why we go to zoos. So we can stand around near the ape cage and say to people .. "No, that's not a monkey. It's an ape...." and so on.
Look a this cute little guy:
Obviously, this is an emperor tamarin, Sanguinus imperator. But the news report…
June 24, 2008
Continuing with our discussion of the Evolution 2008 conference ...
Yet another item from the first day of the conference, the pre-conference teachers day sponsored by Evolution 2008 and the Minnesota Citizens for Science Education (MnCSE) ...
The Minnesota Citizens for Science Education…
June 24, 2008
I had the strangest dream last night:
...The DHS girl had picked up that something was amiss, but a strategically placed index finger run from just behind her ear down to her throat while I explained the situation alleviated her concerns. She was suddenly quite helpful, and half a ton of red…
June 23, 2008
Yes, I too was asked by EA games to install and test Spore. That is their hot new product.
I have run into certain hurdles. This is the best I could do for spores:
Spore only runs on a Windows computer. Well, I have one of those not for any really good reason, as it turns out ... to run games…
June 23, 2008
Triatoma infestans, Chagas vector This is the conclusion of a report to be published in the June 2008 PLoS Neglected Tropical Diseases journal. The report, by Peter Hotez of George Washington University and the Sabin Vaccine Institute, is a clear indictment of economic disparity in the United…
June 23, 2008
NASA's JPL has a new web site which focuses on surface conditions on one specific planet: The Earth.
It has a Sea Level Viewer which is basically a very fancy menu for a number of multi-media presentations, and a list of current or proposed missions. I am not overly impressed with this, but it…
June 23, 2008
Continuing with our discussion of the Evolution 2008 conference ...
Karen Oberhauser talked about the "single species" approach to pedagogy. This involves focusing on a single species and using it throughout an entire course. Karen has taught classes on this approach for teachers' professional…
June 23, 2008
Encephalon #48: The Usual Suspects is now up at Neuroanthropology
June 23, 2008
Or older. In fact, my hero is dead.
For me, George Carlin was inspirational, influential, even formative, on a personal level. For society, Carlin was extraordinarily important. He should have gotten a Nobel for making people think even when they did not want to. He was about to be awarded the…
June 22, 2008
Continuing with our discussion of the Evolution 2008 conference ... many things have been going on and I have more to report than time to report it. But I will get to all of it, I assure you. Tonight, I just want to cover part of today's Education Symposium (moderated by your's truly) ... not all…
June 22, 2008
It has been said that home schooling is a bit suspicious because it is possible for people to keep their kids home to abuse them. This is probably very very rare, but yes, it is possible and there are examples of it. however, home schoolers often (at least the most vocal amongst them) insist…
June 22, 2008
It was actually yesterday, June 21st, but sixty years ago, when the first "modern computer" which in this case is defined as a computer that could store it's own memory, as born i Manchester, England. It's name was Baby.
The Small Scale Experimental Machine, or "Baby", was the first to contain…
June 22, 2008
Stolen from PZ
June 22, 2008
Continuing with our discussion of the Evolution 2008 conference, I was hoping to meet T. Ryan Gregory yesterday. He is listed on the Evolution 2008 program as an author of a talk on genome size. Goodnews/badnews: Gregory did not show, but the talk, given by his coauthor working in his lab, was…
June 22, 2008
Obviously, Uri Geller is a fraud. Always has been. He had tricks he uses to make people think he's bending a spoon using super natural powers, or moving compass needles, etc. Mainly, he uses cheap tricks to fool gullible ready-to-be-fooled people.
Don't be a ready-to-be-fooled person!
Here's are…
June 21, 2008
Continuing with our discussion of the Evolution 2008 conference, I'd like to relate at least the essence, as I saw it, of an excellent talk by Mark Borrello.
I've seen Mark speak at least three times including yesterday, and soon after his talk we continued on the topic in a conversation over…
June 21, 2008
I'm at the Evolution 2008 Conference. It's great. And I got a tee-shirt.
Here's what the front looks like:
This tee-shirt was only available for a brief period for people attending the Education event on Friday at the Bell Museum. That was great too. The connection with the bell museum is…
June 21, 2008
Remember a while ago, I joked that NASA is twittering Phoenix? Well, either they were listening to me, I'm psychic, or .... or maybe it is just a totally obvious thing to do. Point is ... THEY ARE! Here.
