oracknows | September 12, 2006As much as I try to deny it, I can't anymore. Now that I'm on the wrong side of 40, I have to face what we all eventually have to face, the fact that we will age and that our physical and some of our mental abilities will decline. For some of us, the decline will be slow, and we will retain much of our previous abilities into our 60's, 70's, and even 80's. For others, the decline may not be so slow. We all have experience seeing people in their 50's or 60's who look and move as though they are in the 80's, and we all hope that we will be in the former group, retaining most of our physical and…
oracknows | September 11, 2006It never ceases to amuse me when a blogger known for his embrace of bad science anxious to claim the mantle of "skeptic" falls flat on his face doing so. For an example of just such an occurrence, check out Skeptico's latest post, A Straw Man Gets AIDS. In it, Skeptico systematically demolishes an AIDS/HIV "skeptic's" attempt to list what he thinks are supposed "logical fallacies" used by those who argue for the conventionally held scientific consensus that HIV infection usually results in AIDS. Yes, it's an old friend and occasional commenter, a tireless HIV/AIDS "dissident," and Skeptico…
oracknows | September 11, 2006Today is the fifth anniversary of September 11. There will be a whole lot of verbiage put forth into the blogosphere, spanning the gauntlet from blaming all Muslims for the attack, to blaming America for bringing it upon itself, to the idiotic 9/11 conspiracy mongers who will claim that George Bush and/or the Mossad were responsible for blowing up the towers or that the planes that hit the tower were remote controlled. (Who knows? Perhaps the Masons and the Illuminati were involved as well, all as part of a plan to produce the dreaded One World Government.) Given all this verbiage, I wasn't…
oracknows | September 10, 2006It's almost here already, hard as it is to believe. The next Meeting of the Skeptics' Circle is due to appear on Thursday, September 14 at Adventures in Ethics and Science. Given her spearheading of the lastest blog silliness that's been going around here lately, namely the nerd-off that most of us have been engaging in over the last several days (apparently all of us angling for a choice role in the upcoming remake of Revenge of the Nerds), I think Janet is quite qualified to do an outstanding job with the Circle.
But she can't do it without the help of skeptical bloggers, bloggers…
oracknows | September 10, 2006...to feel a bit of schadenfreude over this?
I know, I know, I usually don't stoop to celebrity stuff unless it relates to my interests (science and science fiction, Holocaust denial and Mel Gibson, etc.), but the expression in the picture in the link above was just too priceless for me to resist.
I feel so dirty now. Forgive me.
oracknows | September 10, 2006Pediatric Grand Rounds vol. 1, no. 11 has been posted at Breath Spa for Kids. Enjoy!
oracknows | September 10, 2006Yesterday, I posted about a story indicating that a Danish newspaper had published some of the cartoons from the Iranian Holocaust Cartoon contest, pointing out how, when the original Danish cartoons poking fun at Islam were published, we saw riots, death threats, and demands for punishment. When Iran, supposedly to make fun of the Holocaust and the West's supposed "double standard" with respect to the Holocaust, holds a contest and publishes a bunch of anti-Semitic cartoons, the reaction is largely a worldwide shrug of the shoulders and some fairly minor protests. Some of the collective yawn…
oracknows | September 9, 2006Here's something very telling:
A Danish newspaper has printed cartoons about the Holocaust commissioned by Iran after cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad triggered violent protests.
The newspaper - Information - published six of the cartoons, which are on display in the Iranian capital, Tehran.
Several of the cartoons contrast the plight of the Palestinians with that of the victims of the Holocaust.
Editor-in-chief Palle Weis said he had thought carefully about publishing the cartoons and said it was not a stunt.
He told the BBC the cartoons accompanied a news story about the exhibition. He said…
oracknows | September 9, 2006Just what every kid wants! For children of extreme fundamentalists looking to be raptured, Harry Potter, Star Wars, Spider-Man, or Superman just won't do! What would Jesus think when He returns? Harry Potter represents witchcraft, an abomination! Star Wars replaces God with The Force. Superheroes are too frivolous, and Superman is too obviously a Christ-figure.
So what's the answer if you're a concerned fundamentalist parent who wants to maximize the chance that her child will be one of the chosen when the Rapture comes?
Why, Armor of God PJ's, of course!
Yes, according to the manufacturer…
oracknows | September 8, 2006Continuing on the nerd/geek theme, I would be remiss if I didn't mention that today is the 40th anniversary of the debut of the original Star Trek series. Forty years, hundreds of TV episodes and books, and several movies later, the franchise is completely ingrained in American culture, so much so that catch phrases like "Beam me up!" are recognized by pretty much everyone.
One thing I'm not so sure I'm all that enthusiastic about is the CBS Paramount project to remaster all of the original 79 episodes, replacing many of the special effects with state-of-the art digital recreations of the…
oracknows | September 8, 2006This is just hilarious. I particularly like the part about "hooligans," "Godless Sodomites," and "fag-enabling fools." And don't forget: "the Satanic spirit of mockery." (I wonder if Respectful Insolence⢠would qualify.)
Funny, but Phelps looks and sounds much as I pictured him. Actually, I couldn't watch more than the first half of it, as it rapidly gets tiresome and repetitive. Still, it's disturbing to see that the Westboro Baptist Church nutcases are now doing video, and the production values are actually better than I would have expected. Too bad it's all to dress up truly vile, hate-…
oracknows | September 8, 2006As regular readers may have noticed, I was on vacation the last two Fridays in a row. To keep Your Friday Dose of Woo (YFDoW) going, I decided to resurrect a couple of posts from the old blog that would have made good installments of YFDoW installments, had YFDoW existed at the time when they were originally written. One thing I noticed upon coming back and approaching this first new YFDoW since getting back to work was that it seemed even harder than usual to settle on a specific topic this week. I looked back over some links that I had saved, but none of them fired me up enough to wade into…
oracknows | September 7, 2006With all the nerdy preening and bragging going on due to Janet's nerd-off, I couldn't resist adding my contribution to the festivities. However, a question has nagged at me since I posted about this early this morning.
On January 10, 2005, my score on the Nerd Quiz was 92, making me a Supreme Nerd.
Today, I had to find out whether that had changed; so I took the test again. My score this time? Check it out, baby:
Nerd God, baby!
With that score, plus all my other nerd attributes, now there should be no doubt that I can compete with any ScienceBlogger here, even Mark! And if that's not enough…
oracknows | September 7, 2006I just got a review copy of the new and updated paperback edition of fellow ScienceBlogger Chris Mooney's book The Republican War on Science (website). I didn't get around to reading it last time, but I've already started the first chapter, even though I only received the book the other day. Thus, it would be premature of me to try to review it. However, it's worth pointing out that, although my politics lean more conservative than probably all of the ScienceBloggers with whose politics I am familiar save perhaps Razib (certainly my politics are far to the right of Bora, Mike, and PZ--which…
oracknows | September 7, 2006The blog carnival of nursing, Change of Shift (vol. 1, no. 6), has been posted at Emergiblog. Enjoy!
oracknows | September 7, 2006Janet, Janet, Janet.
What have you wrought? I know you're hosting the Skeptics' Circle next week, which gives you much cred in my book, but why this now?
Annoyed at being shut out of the hottest scienceblogger list, you decreed a nerd-off, and then everybody had to get into the act, including Nick, Chad, Janet again, Joshua, PZ, Shelley (who in reality should be automatically disqualified, having been elected the hottest scienceblogger), John Wilkins, Afarensis, Razib, and Mike Dunford. (Bora tried to deny that he is a nerd, but I detect serious nerdiness underneath that seemingly cool…
oracknows | September 6, 2006Amazing.
Maybe there is hope for the music world after all:
NEW YORK Sep 6, 2006 (AP)-- Bob Dylan is back at the top of the charts for the first time in 30 years. His new album, "Modern Times," reached No. 1 on the album sales chart, selling 192,000 units in its first week of release, according to Nielsen SoundScan figures released Wednesday.
The critically acclaimed disc is Dylan's first No. 1 album since 1976's "Desire."
I picked up the album last week. Although I've only listened to about 2/3 of the cuts, I can confidently say that it's the best Dylan in a long time. It's at least as good…
oracknows | September 6, 2006While I'm back on the subject of autism, I thought I'd post this video that Kevin Leitch created while I was on vacation and posted to YouTube. Let's just say that it takes a rather dim view of autism "advocates," particularly the autism=mercury poisoning crowd.
I particularly love the picture of J. B. Handley that Kev found. It's also amusing to note that J. B. made an appearance in the comments of Kev's post, and he was not pleased. Also, if you're wondering what the whole "Illuminati" thing is about, Kev explains here.
Not to be outdone, Autism Diva produced her own contribution (below…
oracknows | September 6, 2006It's been a while since I wrote about autism. Part of the reason is that I've been on vacation. Another part of the reason is that not much has been happening lately on the mercury/autism front. I like to think it's because the evidence has been accumulating so rapidly that neither the MMR vaccine nor mercury-containing vaccines are associated with autism, the claims of the mercury militia notwithstanding, that the last even semireasonable people have started backpedaling, leaving only the hard core, like J. B. Handley. Indeed, I've spent a lot of time debunking the claims of the…
oracknows | September 5, 2006Sigh.
You know, the President of Iran, Ahmoud Ahmadinejad, is, sadly, not unlike the Energizer Bunny. He keeps going and going and going and going. This time around, he just can't resist putting his foot in it again. Hot on the heels of hosting a Holocaust Cartoon Exhibit as his response to the Danish cartoon incident designed to "test the tolerance" of the West for offensive "humor" directed at Jews and the Holocaust. Never mind that, unlike Denmark, this "Holocaust cartoon exhibit" is being held in a nation with in essence no freedom of speech, where the government controls the media and…