stcynic
Posts by this author
February 6, 2006
I was contacted this afternoon by Scott Hechinger, a recruiter for the New York City Teaching Fellows program. New York City has a chronic shortage of math and science teachers and they developed this program to help alleviate that shortage. In the last five years, this program has helped 7500…
February 6, 2006
You may recall a few weeks ago when crandaddy, one of Dembski's acolytes at Uncommon Descent, posted a link and a quote from Raj Baldev noting a "grave error" in human evolution. When I pointed out that Raj Baldev was in fact an astrologer, a consultant to Saddam Hussein, and a general occult…
February 6, 2006
Feb. 12, 1809 was the day on which both Abraham Lincoln and Charles Darwin were born. Though we now celebrate Lincoln's birthday on President's Day, Feb. 12th is still referred to as Darwin Day and celebrated around the world. This Sunday, it will be celebrated in churches as well. The same folks…
February 6, 2006
This morning, Attorney General Gonzales testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee about the NSA wiretap program. The Republicans on the committee refused to swear him in under oath, which was requested by the Democrats. This is the second time that I'm aware of that this has happened recently…
February 6, 2006
In addition to my disagreement with PZ on some things, I absolutely agree with his post about the administration's many attempts to subordinate good science for political considerations. Many other people have written about this around the blogosphere, based on this article in the New York Times…
February 6, 2006
PZ Myers has posted a follow up to his post on the Muslim caricatures, and while I think he's correct to say that some have caricatured his own position, I still think the uncaricatured position is problematic. Clearly, he is not arguing for Islamic radicalism, nor is he arguing that religion…
February 5, 2006
It's almost 1 pm and I think we're into hour 14 of the Super Bowl Pregame Show, which lasts so long that they might as well have Jerry Lewis host it. The game supposedly starts at 6, but the kickoff probably won't be until next Thursday so they can squeeze in a few more bad commercials and human…
February 5, 2006
So I'm flipping channels last night and I come across TBN, the Christian TV network, where they're interviewing members of the two Super Bowl teams who are Christians to get their witness. And Jeff Hartings, center for the Steelers, makes this statement:
I know that God didn't bring me to the Super…
February 4, 2006
When it comes to the science of evolution, PZ Myers and I are in almost complete agreement; when it comes to other issues, it's scarcely possible that we could be further apart. The latest example of this is his essay on the Muhammed caricatures and the attending controversy. PZ appears to believe…
February 4, 2006
I don't know if any of you saw last night's Dateline NBC show about sexual predators online. It was dragged out way too long and redundant, very poorly produced, but I think the project is very valuable. Working with the folks at Perverted Justice, a group that tracks and exposes folks who troll…
February 4, 2006
As if we needed more evidence of the absolute lunacy of Islamic fundamentalism, here's the latest:
Furious Syrians set fire to the Danish and Norwegian embassies on Saturday as protests over cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad showed no signs of abating despite calls for calm...
Chanting "God is…
February 3, 2006
While I'm showing pictures of people so blinded by religious fervor that they engage in hateful public protest, try these on for size. The first one is from San Francisco, where protestors showed up to scream epithets at gay couples trying to get married two years ago:
The next few are from an…
February 3, 2006
So this guy walks into a bar and says to the bartender, "Hey, is this a gay bar?" I know, it sounds like the beginning of a joke, but it's not. After asking that question, 18 year old Jacob Robida went on a rampage:
When the bartender told him it was, Mr. Robida pulled out a hatchet and struck a…
February 3, 2006
Since I found out that ScienceBlogs has a very cool feature built in for uploading images, I thought I'd go ahead and post all of the caricatures of Mohammed that were published in the Danish newspaper. Keep in mind what prompted the newspaper to publish them. A scholar was writing a book on…
February 3, 2006
Enough said. And that's from a demonstration in London, not Pakistan. Here's one from France:
No. You go to hell.
February 3, 2006
A commenter pointed me to this article about how our state department has reacted to the controversy surrounding the Mohammed caricatures in a Danish newspaper:
The United States condemned the cartoons on Friday, siding with Muslims who are outraged that newspapers put press freedom over respect…
February 3, 2006
My pal DarkSyde continues his interviews with science bloggers with yet another ScienceBlogs contributor, this time Tara Smith. Tara is an epidemiologist who does research on infectious diseases. She's also a Panda's Thumb contributor and the founder of Iowa Citizens for Science.
February 3, 2006
This is interesting. I wrote a few weeks ago about Lonnie Latham, the anti-gay minister who was arrested at a Southern Baptist Convention meeting for soliciting sex from an undercover police officer. In an interesting twist, the ACLU has filed an amicus brief in his case arguing that the ruling in…
February 3, 2006
Radley Balko has a brilliant essay on the Fox News page about a series of ill-considered government policies to protect American catfish farms from competition from Vietnamese competition. Then after reading that, you really should go read the hilariously idiotic emails he received from the hyper-…
February 3, 2006
I watched part of the movie Punchline last night. I don't know if anyone remembers this movie. I'm guessing Tom Hanks wishes no one does, as it's one of the few really bad movies of his career. It's a movie about stand up comedy that doesn't have a single funny line in it. And it's intended to show…
February 2, 2006
Randy Barnett, one of my favorite legal scholars, has a new article available on SSRN called Scalia's Infidelity: A Critique of Faint-Hearted Originalism. In this article, he continues to distinguish "originalism, properly understood" from the brand of conservative originalism of which Justice…
February 2, 2006
Here's an incredible story. A female high school basketball player from New York scored 113 points in a game on Wednesday. That breaks the record of 105 held by Cheryl Miller (Reggie's sister). But that's not the most amazing achievement in women's basketball. The most amazing achievement was Lisa…
February 2, 2006
Sandefur links to this post about the oppression of women in Saudi Arabia and many other countries that wonders why the West has not been as adamant in opposing this as they were in opposing apartheid in South Africa (aside from the obvious practical argument based on oil and necessity, of course…
February 2, 2006
I came across this article at the Worldnutdaily and I'm having some trouble wrapping my head around the concepts found there. The author, Jay Stapleton, is a pastor from Virginia who is urging his followers to pray for God to remove liberal justices from the Supreme Court because the window of…
February 2, 2006
Here's an "I have some good news and some bad news" scenario for you regarding the now-infamous caricatures of Mohammed that have Muslims around the world throwing a temper tantrum. A French newspaper reprinted the caricatures and took a stand for freedom of the press:
France-Soir reprinted 12…
February 2, 2006
Jim Anderson has a slightly different take on the State of the Union address than I did. He actually liked some of the rhetoric (since I didn't bother to listen to it, I didn't much care about what a speechwriter wrote for him to say). Along the way, he makes a point that I do agree with:
No matter…
February 2, 2006
The latest nonsense at StopTheACLU is this post written by "Jay" about a high school student in Florida who is suing because he says he was berated by a teacher for refusing to stand for the pledge of allegiance. The hyper-patriots have been fuming at this student for weeks, calling him a "punk kid…
February 1, 2006
I'll give you a moment to stop laughing at the title of this post. ***whistles for a minute*** Ready? Okay. Here's a good example of the absolute vacuousness of state of the union addresses (and by extension, pretty much all political rhetoric). From last night's speech:
Every year of my presidency…
February 1, 2006
I'm with Zach Wendling when it comes to the state of the union address - a completely pointless hour of interrupted TV programming at best. I can't imagine why anyone takes such an address seriously. It's an hour of empty words that no one in their right mind believes the President has any…
February 1, 2006
I have written extensively in the past about the 14th amendment and the doctrine of incorporation. I'm still baffled by those who take the position that the 14th amendment did not make the Bill of Rights enforceable against the states. The historical evidence against that position is very strong. I…