pharyngula

This is too much verisimilitude. The movie below is of the mating behavior of the jellyfish Carybdea sivickisi, and the first thing you'll notice is that the scientists have set it to good old classic porn music. The second thing you'll notice, that I found annoying, is that they used too high a…

Oh, come on. A poll at a forum for the Minerals, Metals and Materials society that asks, "Which U.S. Presidential Candidate Would Better Advance Science and Engineering if Elected?", and John McCain is winning 59% to 39%? That poll needs some adjusting.

This site, Academia.edu, is kind of nifty, but it'll be even niftier when more people join up. It's a web page that indexes academics, displaying them and their affiliations in a tree diagram. Play with it, if you're one of us, sign up, and if you know a professor, let 'em know about it.

Things are getting ugly at scienceblogs right now — you've probably noticed all the errors in making comments, and those of us on the inside are struggling even more to get through to put up posts. Rumor has it that we may be undergoing some kind of denial-of-service attack — we're short of…

This is shocking news, but not too surprising: I know a few of the people in this facility, and when I talked to them last they were deeply concerned about this possibility. The University of Hawaii is planning to shut down the Kewalo Marine Laboratory. They're doing it so they can funnel more…

This is truly a thing of beauty: Sean Hannity, after using the tawdry guilt-by-association gimmick against Barack Obama, gets the same thing done to him. Watch the man squirm in frustration! Bonus! The clip is presented by Keith Olbermann! Double bonus! It's got Rachel Maddow commenting on it!…

So very, very cold. I am tempted by this hat — as a purely practical matter, of course — since it would do such a fine and stylish job of keeping my brain warm during the long and bitter winter months here. I could even wear it while blogging.

Elizabeth Dole is continuing her campaign in North Carolina of smearing her opponent, Kay Hagan, for simply associating with atheists. We atheists are the "most vile, radical liberals in America," out to wage war on Christmas and stock boy scout troops with homosexuals, and we actively support…

Some guy named Quentin Letts made a list of the 50 people who wrecked Britain. I'm a bit handicapped in reading it, since I don't know who Quentin Letts is, and I have never heard of 9/10ths of the people being damned by him, but I did recognize a few, like Tony Blair and this guy: Anti-religionist…

Octopus vulgaris Figure from Cephalopods: A World Guide (amzn/b&n/abe/pwll), by Mark Norman.

The Nobel in Chemistry this year goes to Osamu Shimomura, Martin Chalfie, and Roger Tsien for the discovery of Green Fluorescent Protein, GFP. That's well deserved — GFP is a wonderful tool, a simple protein that fluoresces. There are lots of fluorescent compounds out there, and most of them…

Occasionally, John Derbyshire gets kudos from the pro-science side of the national snarl because he at least manages to recognize that Intelligent Design creationism is a load of lies and pseudoscience. I've been less than thrilled with the guy; he's generally a creepy fellow who only advocates…

It is the 8th day of the 10th month, and you all know what that means: it is International Cephalopod Appreciation Day. There will be a Wednesday Cephalopod at some time today.

Perhaps this image will help fix the differences between the candidates in your minds.

Never get involved in a land war in Asia, never go against a Sicilian when death is on the line, and never try to compete with me in the crazy email category.

We have another debate coming up shortly, so here's an open thread for you all to chatter on…if the software lets you. There will be no drinking games allowed that encourage alcohol consumption every time POW is mentioned. <sigh> If ever I hear the words "my friends" again, I shall gag.…

Scienceblogs is experiencing some technical difficulties right now: the guts of the machine are being very recalcitrant and generating time-out errors all over the place. Please be patient and heed the message when making comments: getting an error when posting does not necessarily mean the comment…

I've read Steve Jones' books and enjoyed them — so I'm really baffled by this bizarre report of a talk he gave. It's either a massive example of misreporting, or Jones has a solid grip on everyone's ankles and he's straining to pull our legs right off. He claims human evolution is over. The reason…

My email was just beginning to calm down, and now Bill Donohue rants again. He names me and fsmdude, and since people can't find a mailing address for a guy named "fsmdude", all these cranky little old Catholic ladies are sending me their shrill denunciations of youtube videos, instead. Oh, and…

Remember Rachel Bird and Gideon Codding, the spoiled, petulant little whiners who wanted their state issued marriage license to call them "bride and groom"? The ones who were being used as a wingnut cause celebre to argue that gender neutrality really does hurt heterosexual marriages? Bad news.…

I may have to change my voting plans — a real wild card candidate has entered the race. There is, of course, a poll. These guys are going to have a lock on the cryptozoological/weird conspiracy/tinfoil hat constituency, and we all know that that is a huge fraction of the population in this…

The University of Oklahoma joins the ranks of the many universities that are offering a year of Darwin celebrations. I hope the Oklahoma community takes advantage of the opportunity — the calendar has plenty of public lectures and tours and exhibits.

As long as we're acknowledging crafty cleverness, you've got to admit that this is a nice twist on the "My Little Pony" theme. If I had a little girl anymore, I'd get her one. Maybe for the grandkids, someday.

The reason you shouldn't vote for the McCain/Palin ticket is the odious John McCain himself. Talk about sleaze — the man has been a creepy, bullying, spoiled beast his whole life. Similarly, in local politics, Michele Bachmann is corrupt. How these people achieved such a high position in our…

Yeah, I'd hang one of these on my wall. Wouldn't you?

The Reverend Peter Mullin doesn't like those darn pushy homosexuals — they must make him feel uncomfortable and all squirmy deep down inside. He wrote some amazingly stupid things about gays. The Rev Dr Peter Mullen said in an blog that homosexuality was "clearly unnatural, a perversion and…

Since you all whomped that last poll with a ruthless savagery that does a godless brute proud, how about a new one? Should abstinence-only sex ed continue?. So far, "Yes" is winning 53% to 47%, despite the fact that abstinence-only sex ed does not work, and has been demonstrated to be an abject…

Well? It's a good question! Answer it! Every one of you!

John Freshwater, the fanatical evangelical school teacher who burned a cross into a sudent's arm, is in the midst of a hearing in Ohio right now. It doesn't sound like it's going all that well for him. Richard Hoppe has been attending the hearings, and has a regularly updated summary at the Panda's…