gregladen | May 3, 2009...the Minnesota Supreme Court has upheld the right of drunk-driving defendants to request the source code for the breathalyzer machines used as evidence against them, but only when the defendant provides sufficient arguments to suggest that a review of the code may have an impact on the case.
... follow this story here.
gregladen | May 3, 2009... well, not really, you should not burn any book. But don't just leave this one around for your kids to accidentally read.
Source of book.
Hat tip
gregladen | May 3, 2009... In public schools. According to one Federal Judge in the US, not much.
A Mission Viejo high school history teacher violated the First Amendment by disparaging Christians during a classroom lecture, a federal judge ruled today.
James Corbett, a 20-year teacher at Capistrano Valley High School, referred to Creationism as "religious, superstitious nonsense" during a 2007 classroom lecture, denigrating his former Advanced Placement European history student, Chad Farnan.
The decision is the culmination of a 16-month legal battle between Corbett and Farnan - a conflict the judge said…
gregladen | May 2, 2009UPDATE: Confirming that four Cowboys staff members were injured, the extent of the injuries not established. No players or coaches injured. A quick flyby shot of the facility shows a big white and very flat building.
The Irving Texas Cowboys training facility was hit with a tornado and collapsed. There is one injury reported, no fatalities, but there were several athletes (mainly rookies) and staff in the facility at the time. This has not been reported on any news agencies yet, but it was mentioned by a person being interviewed at the Kentucky Derby.
gregladen | May 1, 2009Or, really, it is going to me more like a three way conversation. Maybe we can get Stephanie Zvan involved too, because she's going to be right there. This is not the official announcement... I expect to get the press release tomorrow and I'll post it. But I thought some of you would like to know in advance so you can go to Saturday Night Mass and listen to the show on Sunday Morning.
We're going to talk about Science Education and stuff, as you might expect. 9:00 AM Central Time.
"Atheists Talk" airs live on AM 950 KTNF in the Minneapolis/St. Paul area.
To stream live, go here.…
gregladen | May 1, 2009Michele Bachmann wanted to make sure ACORN (Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now) did not receive any fund related to home foreclosure relief. So she pushed through an amendment in the House Financial Services committee that would disallow funding to any organaztion facing federal indictment for voter fraud.
Because she thinks ACORN is facing such an indictment. Because she has been saying that they are. But they are not. Weren't. And won't.
Her fellow representatives (especially the Dems) must have had fun with this one.
"Oh, righ, Bachmann wants this amendment…
gregladen | May 1, 2009... the web log carnival about birds ... is HERE at Migrations. It's a good one, go check it out.
gregladen | May 1, 2009I have a handful of comments, mostly about how what you are seeing on the news is unimportant, and one comment about why you actually should worry. Within reason.
The new Swine Flu has now been verified in nineteen US states, with 141 cases. Technically there is 1 death, but since the young girl who died actually caught the flu in Mexico (and came to Texas for treatment) it is hard to say how that should be counted.
WHO characterizes the global spread of the flu as a "rapidly evolving" situation. As of an early morning update from WHO, the swine flu has been confirmed in Mexico (156…
gregladen | May 1, 2009US Supreme Court David Souter will retire at the end of the current court term.
Amerians: THIS is why we needed to elect a Democrat to office.
NPR has learned that Supreme Court Justice David Souter is planning to retire at the end of the current court term.
The vacancy will give President Obama his first chance to name a member of the high court and begin to shape its future direction.
NPR
This, of course, makes two things very very important. Listen carefully.
1) Franken has to get to Washington.
2) All other progressive and Democratic Caucus Senators have to be preserved in place and it…
gregladen | April 30, 2009Head First Physics: A learner's companion to mechanics and practical physics I have been watching these Heads Up guides for some time now, mainly in the context of computer software and development. I have not tried any of these guides in IT because, so far, I've felt that while they may be excellent learning resources, they were not ideal reference books, and that is usually what I am looking for. I may be a bit unusual in this regard, but I'm pretty happy reading a reference book from beginning to end, then using later ... as a reference book. In fact, I'd say my ideal combination of…
gregladen | April 30, 2009It is theoretically impossible to observe all of the different aspects of state of matter at the subatomic "quantum" level. This means that at the tiniest level of spacetime, bits and pieces of stuff and action can only be vaguely known, and therefore, if you wanted to build a quantum computer you would have some interesting challenges.
A solution to this problem would be a key step in quantum engineerig. According to Anthony Lang, of Bristol Universtiy, "Apart from providing insight into the fundamentals of quantum physics, [such] work may be crucial for future quantum technologies. How…
gregladen | April 29, 2009As long as we are on the subject (this week) of field guides, I thought I'd go ahead and suggest what guides you might take if you happen to be planning a trip to Central, East or southern Africa1
But since we are doing Africa, we need to do mammals as well as birds. But let's start with the birds.
The standard bird guide for southern Africa is Newman's Birds of Southern Africa and there was a time years ago that this was actually the best book for East and Central Africa as well, owing to a lack of other available field guides. Today, East Africa is well covered by the sometimes hard to…
gregladen | April 29, 2009 photograph of some grapefruit Grapefruit juice contains enzymes that break down common types of compounds of which pharmaceuticals are made. This means that if you drink grapefruit juice along with some drugs, the effect of the drug will be enhanced.
(That was a slight oversimplification.)
So great, you say, why not just take all drugs with a glass of grapefruit juice? Well, I can think of two reasons. One, grapefruit juice tastes like ape-piss, so why would you ever drink it. Two, drug experts feel that they have more control over your dosage if you just leave the grapefruit juice…
gregladen | April 29, 2009
The swine flu maneno in the 1970s was actually a key moment in the history of epidemiology politics. It also relates to the history of anti-vaccine activism in important and interesting ways. I should probably write a whole post about it. For now, suffice it to say that the government reaction to the sudden appearance of swine flu on the scene was somewhat bungled, it is probably true that the wrong people got screwed, and the swine flu itself turned out to be a false start. But please also note that the epidemiology of the present swine flu is very different from what we had then. And…