April 13, 2008
Is the earth falling apart? Have they started using the Hadron Colider early and not mentioned it to anyone? Are we experiencing a Global Coincidence? Have science reporters suddenly gotten interested in earthquakes? There must be some explanation for the nearly simutaneious occurrence of a…
April 12, 2008
A study from the National Violent Death Reporting System of the Centers for Disease Control sampling 16 states and enumerating demographics of the victims of fatal violence and method of violence has just been released. Nationally, there are about 50,000 violent deaths per year in the United…
April 12, 2008
Simon LeVay, who is the guy who first identified the relationship between sexualy dimorphic hypothalamic nuclei in mammals (in the medial preoptic or anterior areas) and homosexuality in human males, has come out with a new book ... When Science Goes Wrong.
LeVay's book looks interesting, at least…
April 12, 2008
ISO takes full charge of Open XML, sets up 'harmonization' group
We can't call it "Office Open XML" anymore, because it no longer belongs to Microsoft Office exclusively. As of yesterday, International Organization for Standardization committee SC 34 passed a resolution that effectively assumes…
April 12, 2008
Scott Hatfield of Monkey Trials reports that an infamous Young Earth Creationist Don Patton is planning a church sponsored talk in a local public high school on the topic of creationism. Scott is seeking help.
If you live in the vicinity, please consider showing up and being a person with a brain…
April 12, 2008
And now the cross-cultural version:
April 12, 2008
Sunday, April 13th, 9pm ET/PT
April 11, 2008
Birds have always gotten a fair amount of the credit for ridding shade grown coffee plants of various insect pests. But a new study now shows that bats have a huge positive impact in this area as well. The study also shows something else interesting: These insect eating bats often use a "perch…
April 11, 2008
In Al Gore's brand-new slideshow (premiering exclusively on TED.com), he presents evidence that the pace of climate change may be even worse than scientists were recently predicting, and challenges us to act with a sense of "generational mission" -- the kind of feeling that brought forth the civil…
April 11, 2008
And the review is very negative. Of Expelled, as well as of PZ Myers and atheists in general.
The man made famous by Ferris Bueller, ... quickly wades into waters far too deep for him. He makes all the usual mistakes nonscientists make whenever they try to take down evolution, asking, for…
April 11, 2008
Storks, pelicans, ibises, and other rare waterbirds from Cambodia's famed Tonle Sap region are making a comeback, thanks to round-the-clock protection by a single team of park rangers. In a project established by the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) and the Ministry of Environment of the Royal…
April 11, 2008
Finally, something really important to blog about:
Johnny Lee demos his amazing Wii Remote hacks, which transform the $40 game piece into a digital whiteboard, a touchscreen and a head-mounted 3-D viewer.
Here's Johnny Lee's site, where you can download the software.
See also The Whoops of Wii
April 11, 2008
Worst Person in the World Monique Davis, who has a thing against atheists, apologized for her recent rant against atheism. after widespread public criticism. She called the object of her tirade, Rob Sherman, and said she was sorry.
Sherman says Davis told him she "took out her frustrations and…
April 11, 2008
Because they are being charged with kidnapping.
(The "are social networking sites evil" poll is here.)
April 11, 2008
It is said that scientists involved in the Manhattan Project to engineer and implement the first nuclear bombs seriously considered the possibility that such a bomb could initiate a chain reaction that would destroy the Earth. Now it is being claimed that the production of miniature black holes…
April 11, 2008
Minnesota Third Congressional District hopeful, Democratic candidate Ashwin Madia, was endorsed by Fifth District's Keith Ellison.
You will remember that Keith Ellison attained sudden national attention when he was first elected to congress last year because he is not a Christian, and many right…
April 11, 2008
It had been assumed that Hillary Clinton would do very well in Pennsylvania against Barack Obama, continuing the relative ambiguity of which candidate should be chosen at the Democratic National Convention. However, recent polls show that Obama is closing the lead, and is now probably well within…
April 11, 2008
Le Petit Singly, a French company, now produces cheese made from human breast milk. And it is not really new.
Apparently they've been doing this for some time now.
"Small Singly is the only cheese made from a woman's breast milk, and has remained for a long time in the shadows of the more ordinary…
April 11, 2008
Carnival of the Blue Eleven is at Zooillogix
Carnival of Space # 49 is at WillGater.com
Carnival of Homeschooling # 119 is at Pondering Heart
Friday Ark #186 is at Modulator
The 166th Carnival of Education is at The Elementary Educator
Grand Rounds Volume 4 No. 29 is at Dr. Wes
57th Carnival of the…
April 11, 2008
What would a music video look like if it were purely directed by the music? Not driven by a concept, nor by a desire to build an image, but purely as an expression of a great song? Designer Jakob Trollback shares the results of his experiment in the form. The song is "Moonlight in Glory," from…
April 10, 2008
This is the first time we are forced to weather a major storm in the Twin Cities without Paul Douglas! We're doomed!!!! This storm is supposed to go for another 24 hours or so.
I am reminded of last spring when there was a particularly bad storm raging outside...
... and Amanda and I had the…
April 10, 2008
... if you live in Baltimore ...
Details and a poll for you to take:
An art teacher at Baltimore's Reginald F. Lewis High School says she was beaten by a student in her classroom in an attack that was recorded on a cell phone camera.
Jolita Berry says the attack happened Friday. The chief of the…
April 10, 2008
John Stossel is the woo-loving moronic co-host of the formerly not too bad but these days totally sucky tv "news" show 20-20.
It turns out Stossel is a libertarian home schooling supporter and reality denialist
Now, I should tell you that I am not against home schooling in principle. But I have…
April 10, 2008
A noted hurricane researcher predicted Wednesday that rising water temperatures in the Atlantic will bring a "well above average" storm season this year, including four major storms.
The updated forecast by William Gray's team at Colorado State University calls for 15 named storms in the Atlantic…
April 10, 2008
Deep-sea sharks wired for sound from PhysOrg.com
Deep-sea sharks have been tagged and tracked and their habitats precisely mapped in world-first research to test the conservation value of areas closed to commercial fishing.
[...]
Shorebird numbers crash: survey alarm from PhysOrg.com
One of…
April 10, 2008
Neuroscientist and inventor Christopher deCharms demos an amazing new way to use fMRI to show brain activity while it is happening -- emotion, body movement, pain. (In other words, you can literally see how you feel.) The applications for real-time fMRIs start with chronic pain control and range…
April 10, 2008
Rube Goldberg is the inventor of the Mouse Trap ... the better mouse trap that is...
He was actually a cartoonist who made famous the Rube Goldberg machines, which were increcibly complicated, intricate devices to do something simple in as many unlikely steps as possible. The board game "mouse…
April 10, 2008
Shuttleworth is the man behind Ubuntu. He has written an essay on his blog (Here be Dragons) on playing nice with windows.
Windows is a very important platform, and our justifiable pride in Linux and the GNU stack shouldn't blind us to the importance of delivering software that is widely useful.…
April 10, 2008
Methamphetamine use in pregnancy changes learning ability of the offspring from PhysOrg.com
Studies have suggested that infants exposed to methamphetamines while in the womb can suffer irreversible brain damage, although the exact effects of these drugs during pregnancy have been hard to pinpoint…
