retrospectacle | August 28, 2006According to this Yahoo news release, John Mark Karr won't be charged in the murder of JonBenet Ramsey, leaving the 10 year old murder case still unsolved. (Hat tip to somnilista, FCD.)
Colorado prosecutors won't charge schoolteacher John Mark Karr with the murder of 6-year-old JonBenet Ramsey after tests showed his DNA does not match DNA found in her underwear, two local TV stations reported on Monday.
Amid skepticism over Karr's claims to have been with the former Little Miss Colorado when she died, legal experts said that it would be difficult to bring the case to trial without a DNA…
retrospectacle | August 28, 2006Uh-uh girrrrllll, I know you didn't! This just makes me downright ashamed of America:
U.S. Rep. Katherine Harris told a religious journal that separation of church and state is "a lie" and God and the nation's founding fathers did not intend the country be "a nation of secular laws."
The Republican candidate for U.S. Senate also said that if Christians are not elected, politicians will "legislate sin," including abortion and gay marriage.
Harris made the comments -- which she clarified Saturday -- in the Florida Baptist Witness, the weekly journal of the Florida Baptist State Convention,…
retrospectacle | August 28, 2006
Link
Save Pluto
Link
Link
How about:
"Pluto is For Lovers"
"Pluto: Voted Off the Solar System"
"I'd Rather Be an Asteroid Anyway. No, Really!"
"Sorry, We Just Had to Make it A Nice Even Number of Planets."
"One Word: Planet"
Off Topic: Everyone go see Beerfest! I saw it this weekend and it was AWESOME!
retrospectacle | August 28, 2006The 2006 Society for Neuroscience Meeting is approaching (in October), and I just wanted to repost this about the Dalai Lama's speech at SFN last year, from the "archives."
First, this post is a summary of online accounts from people that heard the Dalai Lama's speech at the Society for Neuroscience; I was unable to attend his talk (blame my laptop!). The Lama's speech was entitled "The Neuroscience of Meditation," it was one-hour long and was followed by a question and answer session.
A blog run by Neurodudes posted a 'blow-by-blow' account of the talk. This writeup in Science 'Dalai Lama…
retrospectacle | August 26, 2006According to a recent CNN article, a federal judge recently stuck down the Bush administration's request that the laws surrounding pesticide use be relaxed. Yes, they want MORE pesticides and more liberal use of them. I usually stop myself short when I'm tempted to say that the Bush admin hurts America, but this is clear cut. This request would have directly hurt the health of Americans, and the health of endangered species such as wild salmon.
It was the second time in recent years that U.S. District Judge John C. Coughenour chastised federal agencies for failing to follow the Endangered…
retrospectacle | August 25, 2006A few days ago, I issued a challenge to my fellow ScienceBloggers:
"Are you for or against the death penalty, or (if its conditional), in what cases? Furthermore, do you believe that societies that sanction war are hypocritical for opposing the death penalty?"
Quite a few of my esteemed cohort stepped up to the plate and took a swing. If you are interested in my thoughts on the subject, well they are below the fold.
Mike Dunford of The Questionable Authority is "more or less opposed" to the death penalty but reserves the right to fry the extra-baddies.
Tim Lambert at Deltoid discusses some…
retrospectacle | August 25, 2006
The concept of "zero" is a tricky one, as it denotes an appreciation of what nothingness is. Although quite a few species have demonstrated a recognition of numbers (monkeys, pigeons, rats, dolphins, crows, lions, among others) and a few have demonstrated rudimentary counting skills (higher apes and Grey parrots), the extent to whether these same animals understand the concept of zero, or the lack of something, is a completely different question.
As mentioned in one of the first Grey Matters, research done by Dr. Irene Pepperberg has demonstrated that Alex the Grey parrot possesses the…
retrospectacle | August 24, 2006Water is good for a lot of things, from quenching your thirst to reducing the BO levels of your scuzzy roommate. But recent work from the University of Michigan, to be published next week in PNAS, shows that water is also an essential part of a type of cell enzyme called a ribozyme. Ribozymes accelerate chemical reactions inside cells, and are able to change their physical conformation between an 'active' and 'inactive' state.
Previous work in the lab of Dr. Nils Walter has shown that changes which occur anywhere on the ribozyme, even far away from the site of the reaction, change the rate…
retrospectacle | August 23, 2006Ok, this isn't much of a post at all, except to direct you all over to Dr. Bushwell's abode to read this bit of unmitigated hilarity.
Some people should just be denied internet access. Although, how would we bloggers stay entertained?
I also just noticed that I've made two unabashed references to Kevin Costner movies today. I don't think I deserve internet access either.
retrospectacle | August 23, 2006Orac of Respectful Insolence is on vacation this week, and in the hiatus is posting some "classic" Insolence from the old blog. In his absence, I feel the need to continue the fight against woo (and also, I happened to receive this story via email---Hat tip Darkman).
The 35-year-old high school teacher named Bheki was lucky to be alive, thanks to the free antiretroviral pills that kept his HIV in check. He felt strong and had no side effects. Life was normal, as normal as it gets with an incurable disease.
Then in February, he ditched the pills and started taking a mystery potion sold here…
retrospectacle | August 22, 2006Ugh, in a few short hours (8am Wednesday) I'll be under the nitrous gas at the dentist. I really hope I don't get loopier than absolutely necessary, as I *do* need to go to lab today/tomorrow.
As to what I'm getting done, well just a simple teeth cleaning.
Why nitrous for a silly cleaning, you may ask? Because of this. (Scroll down to see the article.)
Hey, not ALL my genes could be great. :D
retrospectacle | August 22, 2006As reported in Forbes, many pro-stem cell billionaires are picking up the cause and heavily donating to research projects to develop stem cell therapies. Following the Bush Administration's further constraints of funding, and limited federal stem cell lines (which now contain a woeful number of defects), universities and foundations were forced to set up off-site labs in Singapore or Europe---and to raise private funds. Enter wealthy, scientifically-concerned people--many of whom are within the Republican party.
Eli Broad sees it as a great way to save lives--and he is tapping his $6 billion…
retrospectacle | August 21, 2006So, similar to how the guys over at the World's Fair have posed us ScienceBloggers with a couple questions, I have one of my own that I hope my brethern will undertake to answer:
"Are you for or against the death penalty, or (if its conditional), in what cases? Furthermore, do you believe that societies that sanction war are hypocritical for opposing the death penalty?"
This question was a spawn from a real conversation I had today w/ a friend, and I can't wait to see the answers this might generate. Readers, please also chime in! I'll probably post my answer as well as the others out there…
retrospectacle | August 21, 2006
It is truly a challenge to write both scientifically, informatively, and accessibly. However, Christiane Nusslein-Volhard is able to strike a remarkable balance in her new book on developmental biology, Coming to Life. She succinctly summarizes crucial discoveries and experiments in the field, spanning from Darwin and Mendel to very recent work in cloning and gene therapy. But, the book does not read like a laundry list of names, dates, and reagents. Rather, the book feels more like a journey through time and science, with Nusslein-Volhard as the guide, pointing out sights and sounds along…
retrospectacle | August 20, 2006Welcome to the 5th edition of The Synapse, ScienceBlog's home-grown carnival on all things Neuro! Glad to see this carnival, much like a precocious child or bad hair day, is growing up and gaining a life of its own. Thanks to all that submitted, we've got a smorgasbord of neural delights for your reading pleasure. Come on people, engage in long term potentiation in the brain, for the brain, about (you guessed it) the brain!
First, Jake at Pure Pedantry tackles a controversial topic, debunking the myth of a significant gender disparity in science, and in cognition.
OmniBrain provides a…
retrospectacle | August 18, 2006I have submitted to Tangled Bank (Landis testoterone article) and Grand Rounds (hair cell regeneration), and both have snubbed me. Hmph.
retrospectacle | August 18, 2006At 16 years old, kids can drive a car, but can they make decisions regarding their health? This is a topic which interests me---a month ago I blogged about the topic in reference to a child whose parents had involved him in a circumcision lawsuit. When exactly are children old enough to determine what happens to their bodies?
This issue has once again received press, this time in the case of a 16-year old cancer patient who wishes to refuse chemotherapy after the first round make him sick. Instead, he wants to try an herbal cure championed by a clinic south of the border, the Hoxsey method.…
retrospectacle | August 18, 2006I wasn't really tagged per se, but I'm going to participate anyway. :P
The rules: "Go here and look through random quotes until you find 5 that you think reflect who you are or what you believe."
Ok, here's my 5:
We are bits of stellar matter that got cold by accident, bits of a star gone wrong.
Sir Arthur Eddington (1882 - 1944)
Returning violence for violence multiplies violence, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars... Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that.
Martin Luther King Jr. (1929 - 1968)
We are told that people stay in love because of chemistry or…
retrospectacle | August 18, 2006
First off, some exciting news for Grey Matters: Dr. Irene Pepperberg has agreed to do an interview for the series, likely in September.
Today's feature on Grey Matters is regarding the neural architecture underlying the learning and memorization of songs and sounds in birds. Hopefully it will help address a wide-spread, but fallacious notion that avian brains are too small and unsophisticated for complex learning and memory. Avian brains are not a primitive version of mammalian brains, but rather evolved in parallel under similar environmental conditions. The brain regions which process and…