pharyngula

Gosh. Maybe I should add Insta-Pundit to the blogroll. (via Oliver Willis)

Let's be clear on this: I'm merely the token moonbat in the wingnut parade, OK? You can tell because I actually have the best hat of them all.

A while back, I mentioned these hate-filled loons in Kansas who were harassing a hotel owner because he was flying a rainbow flag—Pandagon has an excellent summary of the contretemps—in short, he had the flag in memory of his son, the local paper talked up the association of the rainbow with gays,…

The daughter is flying away to lovely Paducah, Kentucky today (another drive to the airport for me, bleh), so I was thinking of suggesting that she visit Ken Ham's brand-new creationist museum for me, as a kind of mole…darn it, though, Paducah's almost as far out in the boonies as Morris, and it's…

You may recall that Martin Brazeau was going to spend July doing fieldwork—well, he's back, and is going to be telling us about his exciting month in a Canadian cow pasture, if ever you wanted to hear a first-hand account of paleontological research.

Kansans, remember to get out and vote today—a low turnout is expected for the primary election for the Kansas school board, and you really want to dump Connie Morris, right? Connie Morris, a conservative Republican running for re-election, said the board had merely authorized scientifically valid…

The carnivals du jour: Circus of the Spineless XI Encephalon #3 Again, this is also an open thread. I got a comment on the last one that more open threads are needed. Is that true? I don't need to go to Atrios-level open-threadery, of course, but if you'd like these a little more often, let me…

Suddenly, the FDA has decided to allow over-the-counter sales of the Plan B contraceptive. They've imposed an age restriction—you must be 18 or over to buy it—but it's a smart move in the right direction, and it's about time.

The other day, I was asked a simple question that I knew the answer to, right off the top of my head, and since I'm nothing but lazy and lovin' the easy stuff, I thought I'd expand on it a bit here. The question was, "How do flounder get to be that way, with their eyes all on one side of the head…

Catch 'em quick before they get deleted. In a post on Dembski's blog that is discussing their Kansas ad campaign to falsely portray the IDist's efforts as solely about teaching good science, there are a couple of interesting comments. Keep in mind that the Discovery Institute has declared that they…

A reader discovered this fascinating graffiti in downtown Minneapolis, near the transit center on Hennepin Avenue. In Minneapolis! So far from the sea, but I'm not alone in pining for it. I may have to look this up. This is a travel week for me, as I have to run around taking care of some…

John Rennie deconstructs an IDist's own definition of Intelligent Design. Here's that definition: ID is the claim that there exist patterns in nature that are best explained by intelligent agency. ID doesn't claim to be a default explanation. It is claimed to be a legitimate hypothesis, supported…

There is now a web page dedicated to the Neoceratodus cause. If you haven't yet fired off a letter to oppose the destruction of the lungfish's habitat, there's a sample letter there to help you get started. It's not too late to make your voice heard!

What an excellent demonstration of the importance of the principle of the separation of church and state: here's a conservative Christian minister whose views on society and politics I find thoroughly odious; here's a liberal Christian with whom I'd be 99% in agreement, but whose moderate religious…

Carel Brest van Kempen has posted one of his paintings of Cambrian animals—be sure to click on it to get the larger size. I wish I had a pet anomalocarid in my aquarium.

I'm an exceptionally sound sleeper. I've been known to snooze through fire alarms.

Assuming that none of my readers are perfectly spherical, you all possess notable asymmetries—your top half is different from your bottom half, and your front or ventral half is different from you back or dorsal half. You left and right halves are probably superficially somewhat similar, but…

Yay! It's the Dr Seuss Bible! (via Secular Front)

You must read Doonesbury today. We ought to be laughing ourselves silly every time those Republicans dredge up a flag burning amendment to distract everyone from their other ridiculous, failed policies.

If you want continuously updated content, the place to go today is Stupid Evil Bastard's joint. He's engaged in a blogathon to raise money for Americans United for Separation of Church and State —so go read, and if you're willing, sponsor him!

The NY Times has a decent summary of the Dobrich case—the families in the Indian River school district of Delaware who are suing to end the state sponsorship of sectarian religion that is running amuck there. Most of the residents there don't seem to get it—I wish people would stop calling this a…

I'm not a cosmologist and I don't even pretend to be one on the internet, but as an evolutionist I hear far more about the Big Bang from creationists than I should…and it's everything from the Big Bang never happened to the Big Bang disproves evolution, and often both opinions are held by the same…

That previous image of squid in flight is now explained: Squid kites!

Muton has some splendid photos of fossil spiders.

Carnival of Socialism #7 Carnival of Education #77 Friday Ark #97 Don't forget—there's another Tangled Bank coming up on Wednesday, 2 August, at Science and Reason, so mail those links to Charles Daney, host@tangledbank.net, or me.

Isn't that a sweet little old lady? I guess the sign offended a few people, though, and they turned her in to the police. Insisting that the sign was simply a lark, Mrs Grove said yesterday that she had never received any complaints about it. But police ordered her to take it down and her details…

Some days, you just want to give up the arguing and go rest your head on the desk for a while. No matter how dumb you think the opposition is, they'll always manage to say something dumber than you can imagine.

Since I shared one paper describing how cephalopods attack, here's another showing step two: what to do with your prey once it is snared by your suckered limbs. Here's a sampling from a video sequence of an octopus reaching out to grab some food and bring it back to the mouth: Sequence of video…

If anyone is interested in writing a Lovecraftian horror novel and getting all the details just right, I recommend this paper by Kier and Leeuwen. They used a high-speed camera to capture exactly how a squid, Loligo pealei, strikes and seizes its prey. Isn't it beautiful? In the first frame, you…

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