emjohnson | August 28, 2009An op-ed in today's Los Angeles Times discusses the legacy of the murder that became a pivotal moment in the civil rights movement:
Fifty-four years ago today, Emmett Till, a 14-year-old Chicago boy visiting family in Mississippi, was abducted, mutilated and slain after he allegedly whistled at a white woman. Several days later, his horribly disfigured body was fished out of the Tallahatchie River. Many such tragedies had previously happened to black Americans and then been ignored.
At Till's funeral his mother insisted that the boy's coffin remain open so that mourners could witness the…
emjohnson | August 27, 2009Well, not really. He just wants to sell some books there. But don't tell that to the editors at The Times.
None of Professor Dawkins' books, on evolution as well as religion, has ever been translated into Arabic, and his work has been heavily censored in Turkey. In an interview with The Times, he said that popularising evolution in the Islamic world, where creationist beliefs are strong, was a challenge he is keen to take up. "To be a bestseller in a Muslim country would be a personal triumph," he said.
Last year, the Islamic creationist Harun Yahya (aka Adnan Oktar) successfully had…
emjohnson | August 26, 2009It took the threat of nuclear annihilation between the two greatest powers of the 20th century to solve one of the most profound scientific controversies of the 1800s. In 1952 Dr. Harry Ladd, a researcher for the US Geological Survey, convinced the US War Department to drill holes deep into the Bikini and Eniwetok Atolls just prior to their obliteration by hydrogen bombs. The reason for the drilling had little to do with the nuclear tests as part of Operation Crossroads, but was simply to conduct an experiment based on the hypothesis of coral reef formation first proposed by Charles Darwin…
emjohnson | August 24, 2009"They say rather than cursing the darkness, one should light a candle. They don't mention anything about cursing a lack of candles."
- George Carlin, When Will Jesus Bring the Porkchops?
In Unscientific America, Chris Mooney and Sheril Kirshenbaum (the latter of whom I consider a friend) are deeply concerned that the American system is unsustainable so long as scientific results and recommendations are not appreciated by the general public or by the politicians that represent us. And there is good reason to be concerned. In their book they cite the results of a 2008 report from the Keystone…
emjohnson | August 23, 2009
Allow me to lay it out as simply as I can. It is my view that religion and science are incompatible in a very specific and important way. I say this as someone who previously drank the Kool-Aid and spent countless hours studying what was described to me as the Holy Spirit. I have been confirmed in the Lutheran tradition and have recited the Nicene Creed so often throughout my life that, as an adult, I no longer paid any attention to what the words were saying. They came out of me as rote, like a wind-up monkey who clapped his symbols at the turn of a crank.
We believe in one God,
the…
emjohnson | August 22, 2009In case you missed some of these, here's the posts I'm particularly fond of from this month. The next week or two may be sporadic as I make the big move to Canada. But not to fear, I'll soon be right back in the swing of things.
The Evolution of Potty Training
Politics, Communication and Unscientific America
Those Cheating Testicles, or Who's Your Baby?
Why Chimpanzees Make Bad Suicide Bombers
The Population Bomb, Nuclear Winter and the Role of Science in Public Advocacy
emjohnson | August 21, 2009This will be my first foray into baby blogging (technically it's my second, however the first ended up being somewhat accidental). What I hope to explore through these posts will be child development through the lens of anthropology and primatology as I observe my child going through various stages. I first wanted to explore a new idea (at least new to me) that my partner and I have been working with: early potty training, also known as Natural Infant Hygiene or Elimination Communication (EC).
The concept of EC is a simple one: mammals don't like to sit in their own waste and, if allowed…
emjohnson | August 20, 2009In a huge breaking story, The New York Times is reporting today that the CIA, with Bush administration authorization, used the private military firm Blackwater (who changed their name to Xe Services after controversy erupted when contractors killed Iraqi civilians) in a program intended to hunt down and assassinate suspected Al Qaeda militants. Congress was never notified nor was there authorization for the program.
The House Intelligence Committee is investigating why lawmakers were never told about the program. According to current and former government officials, former Vice President…
emjohnson | August 19, 2009
Mark Dery, guest blogger for Boing Boing, has a piece up on the "philosophical investigation into the paradox of horrible beauty and the politics of 'just looking.'" In it he highlights the 17th century crypt where the Capuchin's (the religious order, not the monkey) buried their deceased brethren. I visited the crypt when I was in Rome a few years ago and, I can assure you, it's every bit as creepy as he describes.
From 1631 until 1870, the monks buried their dead here---some four thousand of them, reportedly. The musty, mineral smell of the hard-packed dirt floor mingles with the sweaty…
emjohnson | August 19, 2009
The only known photograph of famed head case Phineas Gage was discovered last month (on Flickr of all places!). Jack and Beverly Wilgus had the above daguerreotype for thirty years before realizing what it was. As they describe the image's history at their website:
We called it "The Whaler" because we thought the pole he held was part of a harpoon. His left eye (we have flipped the picture since the daguerreotype is a laterally-reversed mirror image) is closed so we invented an encounter with an angry whale that left him with one eye stitched shut.
We would still be telling that story if…
emjohnson | August 18, 2009As I've been preparing my formal review of Unscientific America I've been struck by the question: who was this book intended for? Clearly it was a critique of science communicators to be sure (more on that later) but as I realized in going through my notes, Mooney and Kirshenbaum's strongest sections are those discussing the intersection between science and politics. This should have been perfectly obvious before even reading the book as it is just that intersection which is the focus of their long running blog (first here at ScienceBlogs and now at Discover).
Chapters 5 and 6 of their…
emjohnson | August 18, 2009Twenty companies have now pulled their advertising from the Glenn Beck Program (eight of them yesterday). The right wing outrage to the free market at work continues to grow.
The website DefendGlenn.com has today attacked Sargento as "the worst company in the world" because they sent the following response about why they pulled their advertising:
Dear Ms. Sorensen -- We appreciate your sharing your concerns about our advertising. Our organization remains true to its mid-western roots and values. Some would say that means we're conservative. In the end, we hold true to our nation's heritage…
emjohnson | August 17, 2009According to a press release put out today by the organization Color of Change, the campaign to encourage companies to pull their advertising revenue from Glenn Beck's FOXNews show earned some major new signatories:
Eight more Glenn Beck advertisers, including Wal-Mart - the world's largest retailer - have confirmed to ColorOfChange.org that they pulled their ads from the controversial Fox News Channel broadcaster's eponymous show. Allergan (maker of Restasis), Ally Bank (a unit of GMAC Financial Services), Best Buy, Broadview Security, CVS, Re-Bath, Travelocity and Wal-Mart join the dozen…
emjohnson | August 17, 2009
The monthly history of science carnival is now up at The Dispersal of Darwin. This is one of the best collections produced yet, proving that The Giant's Shoulders' second year is getting off to a tremendous start. Head on over to check out these great posts.
My favorites in this edition include the following:
Bora at A Blog Around the Clock praises the difficulty of doing work in the history of science:
Many scientific findings were made by adventurous explorers, not people with long and sophisticated scientific training. The line between science and fiction was not very clear. While today…
emjohnson | August 17, 2009I'm sorry, I'm afraid that title's misleading. This is actually an early video of UnitedHealth CEO Stephen J. Hemsley (whose salary is estimated at $102,000 an hour) discussing his principled stance on why he's opposed to the public option in US health care reform.
Or it could be The Money Song from Monty Python's Flying Circus. It's difficult to tell them apart.
emjohnson | August 17, 2009Benjamin Franklin once quipped, "Where there's marriage without love there will be love without marriage." His affairs are well known in American history, however this founding father may have been stating a truth extending to evolutionary history as well.
Christopher Ryan (author of the forthcoming Sex at Dawn) offers some thoughts on the role of novelty in the sex lives of our favorite primate. He suggests that men are drawn to variety in sexual partners while women are drawn to variety in technique:
When researchers decided to look at this issue to develop a Sexual Boredom Scale, they…
emjohnson | August 14, 2009In light of the AstroTurf outrage promoted by right-wing organizations, media pundits and lobbying firms over the health care reform legislation, I thought it would be appropriate to remember the reason we need reform in the first place.
In this interview with Bill Moyers, Wendell Potter, former head of corporate communications for CIGNA, reveals how the current system works and how the insurance companies, drug manufacturers and hospital conglomerates want our health care system to remain exactly as it is. Business is booming and they want those dollars to keep rolling in.
emjohnson | August 12, 2009Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein urges his employees not to engage in "conspicuous consumption" for image concerns after their "record second-quarter profit of $2.3 billion" thanks to a government bailout:
Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein has warned his employess to avoid making big-ticket, high-profile purchases as the gold-plated Wall Street firm hunkers down amid a firestorm of public and political anger over outsize bonus payments. . . "This is a sensitive time for us, and [Blankfein] wants to make sure that we're not being seen living high on the hog," said one Goldman exec.
Meanwhile…
emjohnson | August 11, 2009The Daily Show's Jon Oliver investigates the question of whether humans are more closely related to orangutans or chimpanzees. The answer shouldn't surprise you in the slightest (though it will be quite funny).
The Daily Show With Jon Stewart
Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Human's Closest Relative
www.thedailyshow.com
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Orangutans aren't the only ones who engage in face to face sex. Bonobos do it as one of their many inventive positions. Leaving the genetic evidence aside, behaviorally the likelihood that humans are more closely…