cmooney | October 17, 2007My latest contribution to Science Progress is now up. In essence, this is my final reaction to Hillary's big science speech, which I very much enjoyed--but I did have a number of qualms. One of them was her "crossing the streams," if you will, by implying or stating that restoring scientific integrity to government on the one hand, and supporting U.S. scientific innovation on the other, are somehow the same project. I'd argue that they're quite different things and don't necessarily benefit from being lumped together. An excerpt:
On an intellectual rather than thematic level, however, that…
sheril | October 17, 2007
Never underestimate the impact of the little guys... at least when it comes to fishing practices and North Pacific loggerhead sea turtles. Today in PLoS one, Ocean Conservancy Scientist Wallace J. Nichols and University of California (UC)-Santa Cruz researcher Hoyt Peckham report that small-scale operations are a greater threat to the survival of loggerheads than large industrial practices. This finding comes after 10 years of research and what makes it interesting is the result is not quite what we'd expect...
The New York Times recently explained:
"For an oceanic species such as the…
cmooney | October 17, 2007When PZ reviewed my latest book as if it was a sci-fi novel, I thought the result was hilarious.
I certainly didn't think anyone would take him literally.
But now across my cluttered desk comes this:
Australia's Great Western Entertainment (GWE) has expanded backing for its kids and family sci-fi series Stormworld, with production, investment and broadcast partners from Canada and Australia, and now Singapore also involved.
The live-action 26x30' series follows two teenage friends, Jason and Lee, who are transported to a parallel universe.
It goes into production in January 2008, for delivery…
sheril | October 16, 2007There's sure been a lot of hullabaloo over Al Gore's Nobel Peace Prize. For an interesting perspective, take a gander over at nanopublic where you'll find lots of thought-provoking links to explore.
"Meanwhile, European media are gloating about "a public slap in the face" for President Bush by the Norwegian Nobel Committee and "the inconvenient truth for the current administration" that the prize has "brought to light."
What's interesting, of course (and maybe a bad form of karma), is that George H. W. Bush, father of the current U.S. President, ridiculed Al Gore as "Ozone Man" during the…
sheril | October 16, 2007
We've been hearing lots in the news about Aquarius - America's Innerspace Station, so I call this photo 'Friends in Low Places. It comes courtesy of my pals at the National Marine Sanctuaries Program. (You may remember these are the very same folks that hosted Capitol Hill Oceans Week in June).
Check out my post at Correlations for details on Aquarius and more cool photos from NMSF and you'll understand why this research is yet another reason I love marine biology. For who knows what we'll discover as we continue to explore life under the sea...
cmooney | October 16, 2007From a Fox News online report:
LOS ANGELES -- Jimmy Kimmel is going bicoastal as a TV talk show host.
The host of ABC's "Jimmy Kimmel Live!" will fill in for a vacationing Regis Philbin on "Live with Regis and Kelly" in New York while still hosting his namesake show from Los Angeles.
During the week of Oct. 22, Kimmel will fly back and forth across the country daily, co-hosting with Kelly Ripa in New York each morning and taping his own show in Los Angeles each night. That's two cross-country flights a day for five days.
"I am a little bit insane," Kimmel told The Associated Press. "It will…
sheril | October 15, 2007'Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity -- in all this vastness -- there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves. It is up to us. It's been said that astronomy is a humbling, and I might add, a character-building experience. To my mind, there is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one and other and to preserve and cherish this pale blue dot, the only home we've ever known.'
- Carl…
cmooney | October 15, 2007So: As a result of a dialogue sparked by Josh Rosenau, I now find myself in tiny Hays, Kansas, pop. 20,000, where I'm here to give a talk today at Fort Hays State University. Other than, like, Kansas City, I have never been in Kansas before that I can remember. I flew here in a turboprop. And it's about time: All too often my travels, especially for talks, have been essentially bi-coastal. There's a big country in the middle, though, and quite a lot that I've missed--including some great people, like the folks from Hays, who I've had the pleasure of hanging out with a bit already.
So today,…
sheril | October 14, 2007
I get 'tagged' with these blog memes fairly often and for this one, I'm finally game - but ONLY because it began with my great-great-grandfather PZ to demonstrate something Darwinian. So you know, I'm indulging in 'The Pharyngula Mutating Genre Meme' for the children. Watch kids, today's lesson is Evolution in Cyberland:
There are a set of questions below that are all of the form, "The best [subgenre] [medium] in [genre] is...". Copy the questions, and before answering them, you may modify them in a limited way, carrying out no more than two of these operations:
* You can leave them…
sheril | October 12, 2007'Go read Doris Lessing,' said my favorite Classics professor at Tufts. You see, we both love Vonnegut, Heinlein and all sorts of science fiction, so I visited his office one day asking why there weren't more women writers of the genre catching my fancy.
I took his advice and wandered into the used bookstore in Harvard Square. There among the maze of shelves downstairs, I came upon an old copy of Doris Lessing's Canopus in Argos: Archives The Marriages Between Zones Three, Four, and Five. The book deals with struggles between men and women and dimensions of love and sex. Here's the…
sheril | October 12, 2007Congratulations to Al Gore and the IPCC! Evidence it's not only the climate that's a changin... Hold on tight for November 2008!
The Nobel committee said that Mr Gore and the IPCC should be honoured "for their efforts to build up and disseminate greater knowledge about man-made climate change, and to lay the foundations for the measures that are needed to counteract such change".
The committee praised the IPCC for creating an "ever-broader informed consensus about the connection between human activities and global warming", by involving thousands of scientists and officials from over 100…
cmooney | October 11, 2007
So: I have just gone and done something really stupid in my latest "Storm Pundit" column--namely, made an eminently falsifiable (and almost certainly incorrect) prognostication.
More specifically: I hazarded the very hazardous prediction that there will be four more Category 4 or 5 tropical cyclones globally in 2007. Go here to see my reasoning behind this only mildly informed guess.
And get ready to make merciless fun of me if/when I turn out to be wrong....
cmooney | October 11, 2007Well, I guess our first few Hillary posts were pretty positive...but with Sparticus's post, things turned vicious in a hurry!
And now, I'm here to pile on a bit with some slight criticism. Let me explain.
Lots of us here at ScienceBlogs want the once world-renowned Office of Technology Assessment, or a close equivalent, to return to work for the U.S. Congress. And according to her speech, so does Senator Clinton. This, in turn, has led to statements like the following on Wikipedia: "Recently, Hillary Clinton pledged to restore the Office if elected President."
But there's just one problem…
sheril | October 11, 2007Okay you two legged mutants... Chris and Sheril don't know I'm laptop side again. He's off, I don't know, probably writing about elephants' rear ends (frankly I never understood why all you humans got so excited over that book - with a name like 'Mooney', what did you expect?) And Sheril's likely blogging somewhere else or playing with sea cucumbers. So while they're away, this conure will play and I'm infiltrating The Intersection with good reason...
I've noticed Sheril and Chris have been going with a Hillary theme much of the week and realized to my horror they left out one very…
sheril | October 11, 2007Every now and then, something I write leads to stimulating discussion elsewhere. It seems Razib over at Gene Expression (who happens to be one of my very favorite Sciblings) really enjoyed my New Kids On The Block link on Tuesday to such an extent that he was inspired to remember his favorite boy band as well. But don't get your hopes up for enlightened dialogue because this is arguably not such an example.
And to Razib... Click on the photo to find a special medley just for you. Now watch the entire video and make sure to practice those dance moves for our next Scibling reunion!
As an…
cmooney | October 10, 2007My latest DeSmogBlog piece is now up--as I say, I'm surprisingly optimistic that a lot of the GOP candidates actually seem to take global warming at least somewhat seriously. Except for the real right wingers. Anyway, can you believe Mike Huckabee said the following?
"We ought to be moving rapidly towards energy sources that don't have a greenhouse gas effect. Aggressively set the goal that within a ten year period, we should move a way from a fossil fuel culture to one that has alternative energy resources."
You can read the entire piece here.
sheril | October 10, 2007In one week, I'll be able to tell you about some incredible research on loggerhead sea turtles which has massive implications for ocean wildlife conservation, worldwide.
Before it's published, check out this great piece sent by Wes Rolley featuring the huge leatherback turtles off the coast of San Mateo, California. Leatherbacks are rare and they're the world's largest turtle. These critters migrate 7,000 miles across the Pacific Ocean and can weigh up to 2,000 pounds. If you thought Nessie was cool, well, these animals are real!
And stay tuned for big news on loggerheads...
cmooney | October 10, 2007
I was just surfing the great science blog of Eric Berger, who writes for the Houston Chronicle, when I found a post with this title: "The forecast for Houston, a century hence."
You see, Berger has gone and done a big story about how global warming will affect Houston--and what Houstonians can expect from the future. It's responsibly reported, and necessarily tentative in some of its predictions--but also troubling. An excerpt:
Scientists differ on whether hurricanes would become stronger and if the exceptionally active 2005 Atlantic hurricane season would become the norm.
However, with at…
sheril | October 10, 2007
Another global warming PSA produced by Environmental Defense in conjunction with the Ad Council. Is this a message that resonates with the readers? I expect what's alarmist to some will be poignant to others. But what I can say with certainty is that climate change will be a paramount issue in the 2008 presidential election. Consider The New York Times special politics section that highlights candidates' positions as the coming attractions of what we'll be hearing, reading, debating, and pondering over the next twelve months...
A growing environmental awareness among Americans has…