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A Quantum Bogosity

Okay, well apparently the paper arXiv:0804.3076 which I mentioned in the last post is being picked up by other bloggers (see here and here as well as here) as a legitimate criticism of quantum computing. So before anymore jump on this bad wagon let me explain exactly what is wrong with this paper. THE PAPER DOESN'T USE FAULT TOLERANT CIRCUITS. Hm, did you get that? Yeah a paper which claims that We will show, however, that if even a small amount of imprecision is present in every gate, then all qubits in every code block will be affected, and more importantly the error in any given qubit…

Qubit, qbit, q-bit, or Q*Bert?

My grandfather liked to write letters to the editor. I think I inherited this disease from him. Here are the contents of a recent letter I wrote to the editor of Physics Today which I hope some of you may find amusing. I greatly enjoyed reading N. David Mermin's last two Reference Frame columns on factoring and quantum computing ("What has quantum mechanics to do with factoring?", Physics Today, April 2007, page 8 and "Some curious facts about quantum factoring", Physics Today, October 2007, page 10.) However as the proud one-time owner of the California license plate "QUBIT" (which I had…

What Hath Geology Wrought?

The earthquake in Haiti is only the most recent in a series of catastrophes stretching back over two centuries.  It was not always like this.  Haiti, in fact, was once the most prosperous colony in the New World.  When it was a French colony, known as class="bc_2">St. Domingue ( also called The Pearl of the Antilles), it href="http://www.blackcommentator.com/71/71_robinson_haiti.html">generated more wealth that the 13 British colonies that were to become the United States.    Foreign Policy magazine has a timeline of the modern-day disasters that set the stage for the href="http://…

The Hypothetical Fungus

A lot of work has gone into reconstructing an entire human being in a computer. Computer scientists put in the precise dimensions of a person's body, factor in biomechanics, mimic facial expressions and so on. This work gets huge amounts of hype in the press, but for all the effort and all the attention, the results so far have left me pretty unimpressed. Does watching Kevin Bacon running around without his skin in Hollow Man really make all that work worthwhile? Frankly, I'm much more impressed with work going on in places such as the Genetic Circuits Research Group at the University of…

Religious credulity and the recent spate of godly 'science'

I usually like Cornelia Dean's science reporting, but this recent collection of book reviews put me off from the opening paragraph. She begins with the tired old claim that "scientists have to be brave" to embrace religion. Malarkey. I've never heard a scientist bring up the subject of religion, pro or con, at a scientific conference or associated informal gathering. You can be as devout as you want to be with no risk to your professional career (you may even find yourself an icon for the compatibility of science and religion!), and as for your personal life, being religious in a country in…

Food Inc: Will It Connect the Dots on Food System Problems?

Over the past decade, issues such as fast food and obesity, organics and pesticides, genetic engineering, and factory farming have each captured their share of attention from engaged citizens and advocacy groups. Focusing events, such as the 2008 factory farming ballot initiative in California or the 2000 Starlink GM corn episode have generated spikes in news coverage. Popular books such as Eric Schlosser's Fast Food Nation, Michael Pollan's In Defense of Food, and Pollan's NY Times article "Farmer in Chief" have reinforced concerns among an attentive public and generated reactions from…

At Environment, How to Sell A New Climate Policy

Last night in his State of the Union address, Obama asked Congress to send him a bill that caps carbon emissions, with the president framing the matter primarily in the context of economic recovery and energy innovation: "But to truly transform our economy, protect our security, and save our planet from the ravages of climate change, we need to ultimately make clean, renewable energy the profitable kind of energy. So I ask this Congress to send me legislation that places a market-based cap on carbon pollution and drives the production of more renewable energy in America. And to support…

Attempts at how to categorize SciArt

I was discussing SciArt on several occasions with different people recently and was fishing for a way to classify different SciArt in order to make a particular point - the point being that the type of SciArt I find most interesting and valuable is in the minority. Basically, it seems there are 3 (or maybe 4) general types of SciArt: informational, inspirational, and degradational. I should note that mostly I am talking about SciArt that is performed - mostly plays and movies. Although probably some variant of this can be applied to visual arts or music and such. Degradational is when the…

Ho-hum, another claim that there are no atheists in foxholes

Man, this article is bad. Perhaps atheism is a luxury of the well-to-do. Put differently, everyone--even the most hardcore atheists, I think--will start believing in God if put under a high amount of stress. Think of the last time you prayed to God, and I will bet that, for many of you (whether you generally classify yourself as an atheist or not), it would have been when you were under stress. For most of us so-called atheists, when things go horribly wrong, we think of God. PZ raises his hand. Hardcore atheist here. Nope. I've experienced stress, even thought I was dying once…no gods came…

#1: Cannonballs and the Meaning of Truth

"The world is full of light and life, and the true crime is not to be interested in it." A.S. Byatt "What seems a detour has a way of becoming, in time, a direct route." Richard Powers I had more fun doing this series than anything else in the past 3+ years here at the Fair. It was a unique opportunity and one that wouldn't have been possible without the blog format. I was able to start down a track and let it run as far as it would go. What seemed like a detour at times had a way of becoming a direct route so that, in the end, the meandering came to encircle epistemology, technology, and…

Bush, Mountaintops, and the Midnight Rule Name Game

The Bush Administration put Mountain Top Removal (MTR) on its list of "midnight rules" - a parting shot at the end of this administration in favor of an environmentally destructive industry, a final gut punch undermining of ecosystems in Appalachia. The Times wrote about this a few weeks ago and Friend of the Fair Jody Roberts wrote about it last week over at The Center. Roberts points out that the new ruling "makes it easier for coal-mining companies to deposit the "waste" they create (otherwise known as "mountain") into adjacent valleys." Don Wright, Palm Beach Post (from here) Here is…

I move to have the sanctity of the Oscar Awards ceremony placed within the Millennium Development Goals.

Well, maybe not. It's just that... is it me, or is this Oscar (will it happen will it not?) thing everywhere in the news these days? There's such media saturation that it brought to mind the following thought I had the other day. Say I was an alien coming down to Earth, and I wanted to help, you know, fix things. I want to do this because it's a "highly advanced being with super powers and super technology" sort of thing. Depending on where I land and who I would have contact with first, I can imagine that one scenario is for an informed Earthling to say: "Well, if you want to help,…

Evolution and religion debate in a broader context

The Economist has a great article summarizing all the ways in which the debate between evolution and religion has gone global. It also does a good job of analyzing the different strains within the American debate, depicting it as much less monolithic: Even in the United States, defenders of evolution teaching do not see their battle as won. There was widespread dismay in their ranks in February when John McCain, a Republican presidential candidate, accepted an invitation (albeit to talk about geopolitics, not science) from the Discovery Institute. And some opponents of intelligent design…

Flew's Eugenic Leanings

ID supporters seem to like Antony Flew, the one-time atheist philosopher who has apparently seen the light and become a deist. They have awarded him the Phillip Johnson Award for Liberty and Truth, they have lauded his latest book, and Bill Dembski exclaims "God bless Antony Flew!" But at the risk of raining on the parade, there’s something that Bill needs to realize - the fearless Flew seems to have a very ambivalent attitude (to put it mildly) to eugenics. Prometheus Books recently published its New Encyclopedia of Unbelief, a work to which I provided an entry on Haeckel and co-wrote (with…

Could Princess Leia Have Been a Scientist?

Steinn over at The Dynamics of Cats brought my attention to an interesting topic intially broached over at Bitch PhD. That issue is a little pet peeve of mine: the representation of women in media, advertising, and entertainment. Specifically, guest blogger No_Nym asks: Am I the only one who thinks that Carrie Fisher's slave outfit in Return of the Jedi is part of the reason that there are so few women in science and engineering? George Lucas did shape the minds of a whole generation, seldom for the better. Although Steinn wasn't sure, the comments at Bitch PhD were quite interesting: ...Many…

Making Solar Panels Cheap May Require Different Materials

One of the impediments to the adoption of a solar alternative to fossil fuels is that solar panels are relatively expensive to make. A big benchmark to making them competitive is to get their cost of production per Watt produced comparable to energy produced by fossil fuels. A company in Arizona, First Solar, claims to have broken the $1/Watt barrier for producing solar panels using panels made from cadmium telluride (CdTe). I am definitely impressed, particularly because the company aims to read "grid parity" with fossil fuels, meaning that they will be cost-competitive even without…

Barro on money multipliers and economist sniping

Robert Barro is interviewed in The Atlantic about his views of the stimulus plan (see also a recent WSJ piece here). All in all, he is not a fan: The Atlantic: And I take it from the Wall Street Journal piece you wrote last week... well, the piece is just specifically about measuring multipliers, but I take it that you are fairly skeptical in general that fiscal policy will boost aggregate demand. Robert Barro: Right. There's a big difference between tax rate changes and things that look just like throwing money at people. Tax break changes have actual incentive effects. And we have some…

The Fit-Fat Fight Reignites

The fit-fat fight -- whether someone can be obese but still healthy -- has reignited (if it ever really stopped) with an article in the Archives of Internal Medicine that was reported in the NYTimes. Wildman et al. used data from the NHANES study and looked at the relationship between Body Mass Index (BMI) and whether the individuals had a variety of other indicators of cardiovascular risk -- mostly blood tests that indicate poor cardiometabolic physiology like high cholesterol or high blood pressure. What they found was that large numbers of obese individuals (BMI > 30) had few…

The Oprah Effect: Activating Latent Supporters

Why is this couple smiling? Because Oprah might be the friend they need in order to win ultra tight elections. More than 8 million people watch Oprah's show and more than 2 million people read her magazine. Previous research shows that these heavy daytime TV viewers do not typically follow coverage of politics very closely and do not vote in presidential primaries. Indeed, the majority don't even vote in the general presidential election. So what does it mean when Oprah comes out and endorses for president Barak Obama? The answer is that it is hard to say. In today's political world, the…

FRAMING GERALD FORD: Bi-Partisan Healer, Presidential Clutz, or War Criminal? Ford May Be the First Presidential Candidate to Fall Victim to Infotainment Narratives; Mainstream Media Ignores Ford-Kissinger-Suharto Connection

The game is afoot to define the presidency of Gerald Ford. The dominant narrative from the mainstream media is that Ford was the "Great Healer," an extinct species of bi-partisan statesman who guided the country through the aftermath of the Watergate scandal and the pullout from Vietnam. The lead to this front page story by Peter Baker of the Washington Post represents the dominant media narrative of "bi-partisan healer": A nation deeply polarized by war and partisanship came together yesterday to mourn Gerald Rudolph Ford as a healer during a previous era of division, while Washington…

DOES SIZZLING SUMMER HEAT GENERATE NEWS ATTENTION TO GW? Some Evidence Says Yes; Hot Weather Provides Another Narrative Opportunity to Tell the Story of Climate Change

Previously I posted that journalists and news organizations have a "limited carrying capacity," meaning that they can't pay attention to all issues all the time, so that when one issue or set of issues rise in attention, other issues are bumped from coverage. The relationship is relevant as the U.S. faces what has been called a "perfect storm" of foreign policy crises. These foreign policy topics have come to dominate the news over the last few weeks, but for the majority of Americans, perhaps the most salient issue in their daily lives right now is the record heat that stretches across…

Movie Night

Last night I drove into New Haven, Connecticut, to catch an advanced screening of Flock of Dodos, a movie about evolution and intelligent design. Afterwards I took part in a panel discussion. It was an interesting evening, not only because the movie was quite good, but because it provoked a noisy discussion. I don't want to give away too much of Flock of Dodos, because I would prefer that a lot of people get a chance to see it for themselves. Randy Olson, the creator of the film, spoke after the film and explained that the version we saw was still a bit rough around the edges, and he's…

Consciousness and the Culture Wars, Part Three

Scientists studying people in minimally conscious states have published the results of brain scans showing that these people can retain a surprising amount of brain activity. The New York Times and MSNBC, among others, have written up accounts. I profiled these scientists for a 2003 article in the New York Times Magazine, when they were at an earlier stage in their research. Things certainly have changed since then. When my article came out, hardly anyone had heard of Terri Schiavo, the Florida woman in a permanent vegetative state who is at the center of a battle between her parents, who…

Return to the Dawn of Whales: Cousins Versus Grandparents

Last week I wrote about a new study that identified a fossil mammal as the closest relative to whales, helping to shed light on how whales moved from land to sea. The mammal, Indohyus, was a small four-legged creature that probably spent a fair amount of time in water and ate vegetation. The authors of the new study proposed that the ancestors of whales originally lived this way. Gradually, the whale lineage became more adapted to life in water and shifted to eating meat, as exemplified by early whales like Ambulocetus, which was something like a furry alligator. In the comment thread,…

Bad Science? Vindicating Cognitive Development and the Preferential Looking Paradigm

Over New Year's I had a brief discussion with a condensed-matter physicist who proclaimed that 1) "some developmental research is amazingly bad" and that 2) "they think they can tell what a baby has learned from what direction it looks," topping it all off with 3) "you guys don't even know what learning is!" I won't argue with the first point (there are bad researchers in every field, even condensed matter physics), and I'm too lazy to bother with the third (although the 2000 Nobel prize committee might disagree), but the second point - on the technique of preferential looking - I just can't…

When Noise Helps: Stochastic Resonance and ADHD

The word "noise" comes from the latin nausea, meaning disgust or annoyance. But in the phenomenon known as stochastic resonance, noise can actually be a good thing: it can serve as a signal amplifier in thresholded systems. This phenomenon is not nearly as arcane as it sounds. The image above (borrowed from Stein, Gossen & Jones, 2005), clearly shows how two very weak signals can look very similar (top row), but with additional noise, the characteristics of these signals can be more easily dissociated (bottom row; now you can see one signal is generated by a sine, and one generated by…

Lacking More Than Foresight: Do Children Even Comprehend Time?

Children are famously bad at considering the future consequences of their actions, but some evidence suggests this criticism is slightly off-the-mark: they may not even comprehend "time" in the same way adults do. A variety of findings from multiple lines of research tentatively support this surprising claim about the limitations of children's cognition. Based on the delay of gratification literature, we know that children will reliably choose "less now" rather than "more later" - even at relatively short delays. Children may not be able to adequately represent the value of a future reward…

Fabricating Reality: You Can't Fool Your Blind Spot

Right now, you're blind at one particular part of your visual field - because you have no photoreceptors at the location on your retina where the optic nerve begins its journey to visual cortex. Normally, you're unaware of this blind spot because of perceptual "filling-in" - a mechanism by which your brain actively fabricates the perceptual data it's missing. But this isn't the only case where cognition manufactures perception. In the case of the Kanizsa triangle, you will sense the presence of a full triangle although none truly exists. In other words, your brain has fabricated "illusory…

Pixel Integrity

Let's try a thought experiment. This one comes via Buckminster Fuller: imagine you have a length of nylon rope, which you splice into a length of cotton rope, then into another length of hemp rope. If you tie an overhand knot in the rope, and push it down, through all three kinds of ropes, the knot remains a knot. The material is irrelevant, because the knot is just a pattern that has a specific set of guidelines for itself. Fuller wrote that "a pattern has an integrity independent of the medium by virtue of which you have received the information that it exists." That is to say, if you…

Ozone hole denial

I while ago I wrote on John Ray's claims that environmentalists were wrong about ozone depletion. I think it is quite clear that subsequent research has vindicated the concerns of scientists about ozone depletion. The refusal of Ray to admit that the environmentalists could possibly be right about ozone depletion despite overwhelming evidence is telling---he believes that environmentalists are wrong, irrespective of the facts in any case. I've found another ozone hole denier. In this post, Sylvain Galineau dismisses the ozone hole as "propaganda". I tried…

Inappropriate citations?

Kevin Zelnio of Deep Sea News tweeted the title of this piece and sent my mind going over the various theories of citation, what citations mean, studies showing how people cite without reading (pdf) (or at least propagate obvious citation errors), and also how people use things but don't cite them in certain fields... I was also thinking, I know what inappropriate touching is, but what's inappropriate citing?  So let's take a look at the article: Todd, P., Guest, J., Lu, J., & Chou, L. (2010). One in four citations in marine biology papers is inappropriate Marine Ecology Progress Series…

Does talking about science in social media lead to instability?

NB: this blog post is not about cold fusion! .... and is that a good or bad or both thing? Upon reading something I'd written on scholarly communication in science and blogs, a reviewer suggested I read stuff by Lewenstein.  My first reaction was, "huh?" He's an STS researcher who did a few articles on the cold fusion episode - but not really about the science but how communication happened, how events unfolded, and who knew what when.  But it had been a while, so I thought it was worth doubling back. This seems to be the primary article: Lewenstein, B. V. (1995). From fax to facts:…

First Planet Orbiting Two Stars Discovered by the NASA Kepler Spacecraft

By Dr. Laurance Doyle, an astrophysicist at the SETI Institute, and lead author of a paper that will appear in the journal Science on September 15, 2011. For the first time, astronomers with the NASA Kepler spacecraft mission have discovered a planet orbiting two stars. This is a fundamentally different kind of planetary system than has ever been discovered before. The new system is known as "Kepler-16" and consists of two stars -- one about 69% the mass of the Sun, and the other only 20% the mass of the Sun, which circle each other every 41 days. Around both of these circles the Saturn-mass…

Kleck's DGU numbers

kebarnes writes: Are Kleck's numbers concerning the self-reporting of robbery and burglary incidences from this survey out of line with the comparable NCVS results, for instance? Rs to Kleck's survey reported that 5.5% (274/4977 Rs) had been a burglary victim within the past year, and 2.5% (124/4977 Rs) had been a robbery victim within the past year. This would imply (if I'm correct) some 242,600 robberies and 533,800 burglaries. You dropped a decimal: it's 2.4 million robberies and 5.3 million burglaries. And 500,000 (20%) of robberies where a gun was used for defence. And 850,000 (16…

Leaked Scientology Documents Reveal Church Values

Earlier this week a classified Scientology contract was leaked (full pdf document here), revealing the paranoid nature of the Church. The document is entitled Application, Declaration and General Release Declaration of Religious Commitment and Application for Membership in a Scientology Religious Order and for Active Participation on Church Staff. This contract must be signed by anyone who wishes to engage in "active participation as a staff member within the Church of Scientology" as a Class V Org member. Among the items they must agree to are: 8. I am not related to or connected with any…

Can PTSD be both over- and underdiagnosed?

When you propose that we are overdiagnosing PTSD in vets, you run into not only a lot of flak but many offerings of evidence suggesting that we're missing a lot of cases. Since publishing my article on PTSD, I've received those arguments directly in comments, and on Wednesday, April 8, Salon published an article, "I am under a lot of pressure to not diagnose PTSD," by Michael de Yoanna and Mark Benjamin, that offers unsettling evidence that at least some doctors working for the VA are being pressed to not diagnose PTSD in combat vets. So which is it? Are we under- or overdiagnosing PTSD in…

The Gruber Prize in Cosmology is awarded to, among many others, me

This is really cool. Several years ago, the Gruber Foundation established a prize in cosmology. Last year (2006) the award went to John Mather and the COBE team; you may recall that Mather was one of the two winners of this year's Nobel Prize in Physics. This year the award is being split four ways: (1) Saul Perlmutter, leader of the Supernova Cosmology Project (SCP); (2) Brian Schmidt, leader of the High-Z Supernova Team (HZT); (3) the members of the SCP who were on the Perlmutter '99 paper; and (4) the members of the HZT who were on the Riess '98 paper. These two papers were the…

Mansour Mohamadzadeh is my god.

For anyone who knows me well, you know there are only 2 things that truly terrify me. The first is moths. They're just creepy. The second, and more logical, is needles. I am a big baby when it comes to shots. I've passed out after getting them. I need someone to hold my hand and talk me through them. Getting novocaine in my foot for minor surgery is the WORST experience of my life. I still have nightmares about the 4" long needle sticking out of my heel, slowly pumping the burning liquid into my flesh for over a minute while I had to sit perfectly still, watching in horror... Say sayonara…

A new branch on the tree of whale evolution

Paleontologists have found a new fossil of a whale ancestor - and its announced just after I finish watching my preview DVD of Nat Geo's Morphed on whale evolution. I smell fate. Anyhow, the new whale predecessor was unveiled in a PLoS One article this week. Donned "Maiacetus inuus", the species is described from two adult fossil finds, and reveals even more about whales evolved. Maiacetus inuus is a new species of Protocetid whale, roughly 2.6 m long and dated to be about 47.5 million years old. Like other Protocetids, Maiacetus' limbs are relatively short and pelvic girdles provide a…

Something Smells Funny.

Ok, the consistent reader of this blog can't help but notice that I am a sucker when it comes to unique studies about human relationships and the trappings that go with them. The biological basis and interaction with behavior is simply fascinating to me. This is why I had to report on a study that showed even without knowing it, women's brains picked up on the smell of arousal in men's sweat. And, following that vein, I can't help but write about a new olfactory study, which found that a woman's passion for her man affects her ability to identify the smell of other men in her life.…

The Hamdan Verdict

Sometimes the only thing that separates comedy from tragedy is the involvement of an actual living human being. That certainly seems to be the case where today's military commission verdict in the trial of Salim Hamdan. Despite having the advantages of what we must, for the lack of a better word, call a legal system that was set up to give the prosecution the edge, despite the admission of hearsay evidence, despite the use of material taken from interviews that didn't come within a light year of the Miranda guidelines, and despite the use of secret prosecution testimony, the prosecution…

The McCain Citizenship Nonsense

By now, there's a good chance that you've read something or another about the whole "Is John McCain a "Natural Born" Citizen" thing - it's caught quite a lot of attention over the last few days. It's certainly caught mine - not because I'm concerned about the question of whether military brats born overseas can be president, but because so many people are acting like complete idiots. If you're not familiar with the story, here's a quick rundown. The Constitution requires that the President be a "natural born" citizen. John McCain was not born in the United States. He was born in the Panama…

Menopause: It Helps You Save On Winter Heating Bills

Last winter it was not uncommon for me to go to bed wearing two flannel nightgowns. I would hunker down under our thickest comforter, pressed up against Mr. Zuska for warmth. Mr. Zuska, like many men, is an astonishing heat source, for which I have been grateful on many a chilly night. This winter, things are different. I wear a short-sleeved t-shirt and a pair of cotton shorts to bed. We haven't broken out the heavy comforter. Sometimes I can't tolerate being too close to Mr. Zuska's blast furnace body. What changed? It's menopause! The mid-forties seem a little young to me for…

Know Thine Enemy

Kylie at Podblack asks, for the next Scientiae, "A voice in the crowd" - are you heard? How are you heard? Are you one of a team that works as a choir or does discordance rule the roost?...who really has control of the megaphone? Heh. How am I heard? Depends greatly upon the listener, and how far they've come in examining their own types of unearned privilege. Cranky, irritable misogynistic Rethuglicans hear me as a shrill, whiny, petulant, hairy-legged, man-hating, castrating feminazi. Yes, Gerard Harbison, you can think of that as an homage to you! You are a cranky irritable…

I've Been Called A "Thinking Blogger"

Karmen at Chaotic Utopia has honored/saddled me with the Thinking Blogger Award/meme. I rarely ever participate in memes. But since this one is disguised as a compliment I'll make an exception. Since this comes from Karmen, I do take it as a compliment - thank you, Karmen! It was nice to read what you wrote about me...especially this week, which is a bit of down week for me. So, okay, here's the award/meme guidelines: If, and only if, you get tagged, write a post with links to 5 blogs that make you think, Link to this post so that people can easily find the exact origin of the…

"Conversations We Need To Have"

I think my favorite part of the day at the Science Blogging Conference was when Dr. Free-Ride gave her talk. It was titled "Adventures In Science Blogging: Conversations We Need To Have, and How Blogging Can Help Them". I am hoping she will turn this into a paper and publish it somewhere so I don't want to steal all her thunder. But I do want to share just a bit of what she talked about. Dr. Free-Ride talked about the need for community and communication as key ingredients for human beings to flourish. She also drily noted that since, when she last checked, scientists are still human…

Michael Issues a Gender Equity Challenge!

Regular reader and blogger Michael Anes wrote to tell me: I haven't heard any Scienceblogging on the gender equity report issued this morning and profiled on the Chronicle? Did you check it out?...My post and challenge is here -- I'd be interested in your take on the issue and the action I suggest! (For modesty's sake I removed the line where Michael told me how great I am.) Michael is referring to the new report issued by the AAUP, AAUP Faculty Gender Equity Indicators 2006, and discussed in the Chronicle of Higher Education. The report contains, as you might expect, dismal news for women…

"We are what is wrong, and we must make it right"

Last night, in Oslo, Al Gore delivered a simple, powerful message. It's a familiar message to anyone who has watched him speak since 2000, or watched his movie, or read his books. It's simply a call for nothing more or less than the need for all of us to accept responsibility for the effects of our actions: So today, we dumped another 70 million tons of global-warming pollution into the thin shell of atmosphere surrounding our planet, as if it were an open sewer. And tomorrow, we will dump a slightly larger amount, with the cumulative concentrations now trapping more and more heat from the…

It's Called "Political Cover"

Jason Rosenhouse thinks that PZ, Ed Brayton, Revere, and I have reached a "strange conclusion" about the recent Democratic cave-in on wiretapping. It doesn't make sense, at least to him, that we'd blame the Democrats, given that 80% of the Democrats in Congress didn't vote for the wiretapping bill. (That figure doesn't appear to include the substantial number of legislators - particularly in the Senate - who lacked the courage to vote on this measure at all, but I get Jason's basic point.) Given that why are we mad at the whole party? Mostly, it's because the party leadership really did…

Morning Roundup

The big news here today is all about evolution - we've got the rhesus monkey genome and Tyrannosaurus rex protein sequences published. There's also some cool science policy stuff to look at - there's information on abstinence-only sex ed and more manatee material available. Finally, we've got an excellent - although sad and nearly tragic - example of how government policies can (if followed) help reduce injuries in certain situations. More Monkey Business: As I mentioned yesterday, the rhesus macaque genome was released yesterday. Carl Zimmer wrote an excellent blog post on the project,…