Search Content

Displaying results 61251 - 61300 of 87947

Things you might want to know about

The last Kodachrome processing machine, at Dwayne's Photo in Parsons, Kansas, shut down and will be sold for scrap. This is a bummer, because I think I still have some film laying around that I've not gotten 'round to getting developed. They figured out why Skype crashed earlier this month, and it has to do with a bug in a Windows version of Skype that users should have updated but didn't. But don't blame the users. They were using Windows, and there is no automatic updating process for software on Windows, like there is in, ahem, Linux. People who use unsecured operating systems such as…

The great thing about Apple is that all the hardware and software are designed to work together ...

... like clockwork. Orange that is. Or perhaps 1984 is a better analogy, and that would be rather poignant, considering that Apple is said to have made a huge initial impact years ago with its anti-1984 ad. We should have known then that a company using 1984 as a means of selling itself would eventually develop into its own Orwellian nightmare. The latest? ... a representative from developer relations informed the CEO of Mediaprovider, a small magazine publisher based in Denmark, that he couldn't put a magazine about Google's (GOOG) Android on the App Store. According to Mediaprovider'…

Tomas is, suddenly, a hurricane ...

... and almost as interesting as his enigmatic sister, Shary. Tomas formed farther south than Hurricanes often do, hung around for a long time as a tropical depression, then blew up to hurricane strength very quickly. Having been declared a hurricane just a few moments ago, it may reach Category Three status as early as Monday, certainly by Tuesday. It will track in it's current direction, staying south of DR/Haiti and heading pretty much directly towards Jamaica, though it will likely turn north towards Cuba before hitting Rastaland. I can't see how Tomas is NOT going to be a serious…

Yet another flu falsehood

"I don't need the Swine Flu vaccine because I already had the Swine Flu when it went around in the 1970s" Sorry, you do. While we're on the subject, a couple more: "I had the mist vaccine for the seasonal flu, so now I have to wait a month to get the H1N1 vaccine" No you don't. You should not have both vaccines as a mist without a waiting period between, but if one is a mist and one is shot, no problem. They can be taken on the same visit, on the same day. "I can't afford a Swine flu vaccine." Yes you can, it is free from most sources. That have it. Which there hardly are any yet…

Wilson Rebuked

Rebuke. v. Call on the carpet: censure severely or angrily; "The mother scolded the child for entering a stranger's car"; "The deputy ragged the Prime Minister"; "The customer dressed down the waiter for bringing cold soup" The house rebuked Wilson. It was almost a party line vote, but not completely. The wisdom on the street is that the Democrats will pay a small cost for this, as Wilson, the snotty face whinging Republican from South Carolina will play the victim. But, the wisdom on the street is also that this was the right thing to do. That is the difference between Republicans and…

Randy Neugebauer is the latest poster boy for Republican yahoohism

A statement from the statesman: "Last night was the climax of weeks and months of debate on a health care bill that my constituents fear and do not support. In the heat and emotion of the debate, I exclaimed the phrase 'it's a baby killer' in reference to the agreement reached by the Democratic leadership. While I remain heartbroken over the passage of this bill and the tragic consequences it will have for the unborn, I deeply regret that my actions were mistakenly interpreted as a direct reference to Congressman Stupak himself. "I have apologized to Mr. Stupak and also... Oh shut up,…

Is Sunnydale in San Joaquin County?

Some ditzy entrepreneur in California has a new twist on bottled water: As the body thirsts, so does the soul. So why drink regular drinking water when you can partake in a more blessed beverage? Bottled Holy drinking water is bottled in Stockton, California and blessed by priests from southern California. Funny…the advertising doesn't mention anything about vampires even once, although it does have a warning sticker: Warning to sinners: If you are a sinner or evil in nature, this product may cause burning, intense heat, sweating, skin irritations, rashes, itchiness, vomiting, bloodshot and…

Don't be anybody's Charlie Brown

When I post about race, the racists show up and use my blog to spew their hokey science all over the place. There are reasons that I tolerate that to a certain extent, but there are limits. When a student shows up in a classroom and starts asking "innocent" questions of the teacher about "radiocarbon dating" and "transitional fossils" and such the teacher is being played by the student, who was likely trained (as it were) by some crazy yahoo parent or preacher. When AGW denialists show up on a science blog and start quoting from the famous stolen emails ... same thing. If such abuse of blog…

The 86th Meeting of the Skeptics' Circle: A bitch of a meeting. Really.

Sometimes being a skeptic can be a real bitch. And no one knows that better than the host of the latest installment of a blog carnival that has, believe it or not, been running over three years now, the ever-popular Skepbitch. She's served up a heaping helping of the best skeptical bitching from the last two weeks. Head on over and enjoy! Next up to host is Action Skeptics on May 22. If you're a blogger, start getting your best skeptical posts ready to submit for the next Skeptics' Circle. Finally, as always, if you're interested in hosting, check out the schedule and guidelines, as well as…

Don't annoy the radiologist...

...or so says #1 Dinosaur, who was buried under a blizzard of radiology reports. I tend to agree up to a point, but the only problem from my perspective is this: Until recently, it was not at all uncommon for me to get seemingly millions of copies of every radiology report for mammography, ultrasound, and core needle biopsies on my patients. There's a preliminary report, a final report, an amended report, a report with the pathology report added, a report with the pathology report and the estrogen/progesterone receptor status added, and then multiple copies of the final report. We ended up…

Coloring Ancient Animals

Image Credit: The Scientist; R. Hartley, Univ of Manchester; T. Larson, Black Hills Inst.; G. Stewart; SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory I just read the neatest article in Science Magazine on how a team led by researchers from the University of Manchester has re-created the pigmentation of fossilized birds like the artist's rendition of the extinct C. sanctus above. They accomplished this by mapping possible chemical residues of melanin pigments using synchrotron x-rays. The researchers believe that trace metals found in the fossils, such as copper, calcium and iron, may be chemical…

David Ruskin Says...

In a time of economic crisis (or really any crisis), it is difficult to think too far into the future. Still, if America is to be a significant force in the scientific world of the future, we need to invest in our primary education system now, putting a particular emphasis on basic science education. We have to remember that science is a process -- often a long process -- and if we do not dedicate ourselves today to teaching our children how to think critically, rationally, pragmatically, then we will short ourselves our future scientific manpower. Putting money into research programs now is…

Why is Yale Environment 360 spreading the DDT ban myth?

Yale Environment 360 has damaged its credibility by publishing a piece by Fred Pearce claiming: When Rachel Carson’s sound case against the mass application of DDT as an agricultural pesticide morphed into blanket opposition to much smaller indoor applications to fight malaria, it arguably resulted in millions of deaths as the diseases resurged. But the public health use of DDT was not banned. Look at the graph below (from Nature Vol 294 26 November 1981 page 302) plotting DDT usage against malaria cases in India during the malaria resurgence in the 70s. It is arguable whether the increased…

The Worst Presentation Award Goes Toâ¦

Boffo blog tells the story of a Lott presentation at a workshop about a decade ago: I was not prepared for how truly awful the paper was. His argument concerned how expensive elections have become in this country. ... His evidence consisted of a correlation between growth in federal spending and growth in campaign spending, and from that he concluded that Big Government caused expensive campaigns. Two lines trending upwards, and he claims with perfect seriousness---and without performing any of the necessary tests---that the one causes the…

National Academy of Sciences reports on Firearms and Violence

The National Academy of Sciences panel on firearms and violence has reported its findings. The press release says: There is no credible evidence that "right-to-carry" laws, which allow qualified adults to carry concealed handguns, either decrease or increase violent crime. To date, 34 states have enacted these laws. There is almost no evidence that violence-prevention programs intended to steer children away from guns have had any effects on their behavior, knowledge, or attitudes regarding firearms. More than 80 such programs exist. Research has found associations between gun…

Handing out a little rope

This fellow, Daniel J. Lewis, from Answers in Genesis has come along and requested a space to defend creationism. Then if the blog administrator allows it, I'm available to publicly discuss creation vs. evolution if we can do so on level, intelligent grounds without childish attacks. You can start with your belief system (naturalism), and I can start with mine (the Bible). Perhaps the blog administrator will create a specific area where we can do this. (Preferably a place to which I can subscribe via RSS or email.) I'm open to debate, are you? I'm not too keen on accommodating creationist…

Why Don't All Whales Have Cancer?

Knowing my fascination with body size variation among organisms , Peter sent a link along for a new paper, "Why don't all whales have cancer? A novel hypothesis resolving Peto's paradox." Included in the email was a gentle prodding to post on this unique paper. Peto's paradox is that cancer is fundamentally different across mammals. If all mammalian cells have an equal probability of developing a mutation leading to cancer, all else being equal, then larger sized organisms with more cells should have a higher incidence of cancer. Equally, because larger organisms are longer lived then the…

Oasis in the Sargasso Sea

Wood's Hole researchers in the Eddies Dynamics, Mixing, Export, and Species composition (EDDIES) project confirmed that ocean productivity is enhanced by upwelling eddies in the oligotropic Sargasso Sea. The slowly swirling water masses were teeming with diatoms in concentrations 10,000 to 100,000 times the norm, among the highest ever observed in the Sargasso Sea. They compare these features to "oases in the desert". The researchers employed a combination of remote sensing, video plankton recorders, ocean drifters, tracers and traditional measurements of water properties and current speeds…

Plush ROV

Since my posts about the Black Swan, I have somehow made it on the Odyssey email list. Once a month or so I get an email about buying goods and artifacts. Admittedly, I find these emails extremely irritating. Like I got nothing better to do with my time than weed through a lot of junk email. Moreover, I am a post doc with limited funds. I will absolutely never have an extra $2500 laying around to purchase a Cathedral 3 Berry Pickle Bottle. I don't even like pickles. Today's email from Oydssey completely hooked the consumer. Yes, I am a mindless drone and here is my money. I am…

FFRF Convention

This weekend, October 6-8, San Francisco will be the site of the 29th annual convention of the Freedom From Religion Foundation. Among the activities will be talks by Sam Harris (The End of Faith) and Dr. Richard Sloan (Blind Faith: The Unholy Alliance of Religion and Medicine). Julia Sweeney, of Saturday Night Live fame, will receive the "Emperor Has No Clothes" award and will also be performing "Letting Go of God", her one-woman show described as a "beautiful loss of faith story". One thing I love about the FFRF is that in spite of the serious nature of their work (frequently involved in…

A victory in Louisiana

This is fabulous news: the Louisiana school system has been wrestling with a proposal from the Louisiana Family Forum (you know the rule: the word "family" in their title means they're anything but) which would have had the schools using science textbooks with absurd warning labels and watered down content. The Board of Elementary and Secondary Education has seen the light, however, and voted 6 to 1 in favor of using quality textbooks for the kids of Louisiana. It's an all-around win for everyone. The Louisiana Patriarchy Forum is not happy. They are venting their frustration a bit with a…

Dress For Success! Or Not!

Ladeez! Please remember not to be too fat, because James Watson doesn't want to hire your ugly ass. Everybody knows fat people can't do science. But they don't care if we say so, because they are so jolly, and lack ambition! Likewise, it is also not good to be beautiful and curvaceous, and wear clothes that fit you. For alas, Citibank will have to fire you. Your tailored clothing is "too distracting". You distracting ladee, with your distracting turtlenecks!!! Begone from our stolid gentlemanly banking establishment!!!! Too thin, too thick, too sexy, not sexy enough - clearly, there…

Climate change and Darfur

Climate Progress highlights an article in the Atlantic Monthly arguing that: The violence in Darfur is usually attributed to ethnic hatred. But global warming may be primarily to blame. I don't have a subscription, so I'm relying on Climate Progress's account. Apparently, the author argues that changes in sea surface temperature are likely to have weakened monsoon rains in Darfur. The ecological crisis that resulted from lower rainfall led to the conflict over land, and then to the genocide. There is another way that climate change is involved. A major political barrier to action on Darfur…

Let the fireworks begin!

The Freedom From Religion Foundation has won a significant court case: the National Day of Prayer has been declared unconstitutional. The judge made a cautious and conservative judgment, but you know the right-wing is going to freak out. Crabb wrote that her ruling was not a judgment on the value of prayer. She noted government involvement in prayer may be constitutional if the conduct serves a "significant secular purpose" and doesn't amount to a call for religious action. But the National Day of Prayer crosses that line, she wrote. "It goes beyond mere 'acknowledgment' of religion because…

Fox/henhouse

The Energy Department is doing a major policy analysis of energy policy and future directions. Obviously, the major issue has to be finding ways to reduce our reliance on petroleum, especially from foreign sources, and replacing it with renewable domestic sources. Who, then, do you expect was picked to head up the panel writing this report? The question is not who you would choose, but who you expect was chosen by the administration that put a Safari Club member in charge of our wild lands. If you guessed Lee Raymond, former CEO of ExxonMobil, then congratulations, you understand the craven…

Iceland: is that a geyser or a blowhole

Iceland breaks ban on commercial whaling: Iceland announced last week that it would resume commercial whaling, ignoring a worldwide moratorium that came into effect in 1986. They kicked things off by killing a fin whale, one of only 30,000 estimated to be alive as of 2001. A female gives birth to a single calf every couple of years after a year-long gestation. That low reproductive rate means that recovering from historical hunting has been very slow. More than 10,000 fin whales were taken annually between 1946 and 1965, and lower numbers were taken until the whaling ban was imposed in…

Crime victims' families: Kline should stop lying

Phill Kline (the extra l is for "lying") has been claiming that his challenger in the race for Kansas Attorney General created a crime wave through a sentencing reform law he helped draft. Morrison has been defending himself vigorously, and now he gets support from a surprising corner. A foundation established by two Kline supporters, one a former employee, takes him to task: This irresponsible claim and attempt to instill fear in Kansas Voters is the worst example of demagoguery. To insinuate that massive murders, rapes, and general criminal rampage resulted by this bill is not only…

The Republican War on Science … funding

The Scientific Activist documents the atrocities. Basic research is the proper domain of government funding, because the benefits accrue broadly. Sometimes we learn something narrow enough to be patentable, but often the result is fundamental enough to open up whole new realms of opportunity, new fields for companies to compete in. The incentive to do that basic research doesn't exist for a lot of companies, even though they would benefit immensely from it. Every year, the President asserts that he wants to raise science funding, but every year of his presidency, the amount spent on grants…

Stop by and say "Hi"

more cat pictures This afternoon I'll be hanging out with the NYC Skeptics and ScienceBlogs fans in New York but I know that many of you (for obvious reasons) can't be there. In lieu of a meet-up in meatspace, then, why not introduce yourself here? Each blog is a little community unto itself, and even if you don't normally write I would encourage you to leave a comment about who you are and why you like to read this blog. If the last de-lurking day is any indication this blog attracts readers like a hapless Tenontosaurus lures hungry Deinonychus, everyone from professional paleontologists to…

Is anybody out there?

Last month I met up with hordes of bloggers & journalists at the 2nd annual Science Blogging Conference, but it seems that readers of Sb are increasingly organizing their own meetings. Rather than turn away in a huff muttering "Well I guess you just don't need us anymore," many of us Sciblings want to encourage this emerging behavior among our readers, and a good way to get started would be to join the ScienceBlogs.com fan club on Facebook. It may be a little primitive, but you can browse the list of fans and see who's in your area if you wanted to organize your own meet-up. I have no…

iPod Random Ten

I'm sorry I still haven't put up my post about dinosaurs & mythology as yet; I've had a bit of a stressful/depressing day and I just wasn't up to the task of finishing it. I'll definitely finish it tomorrow, however, just in time for the next installment of The Boneyard over at Amanda's place. In the meantime, I thought I would put up something frivolous since it's a Friday night. Here's 10 videos for 10 random songs currently in circulation on my iPod shuffle (feel free to carry this on as a meme if it suits you); Reel Big Fish - "Take On Me" Aerosmith - "Eat the Rich" SUM 41…

Burpee's 10th Annual PaleoFest

If you're going to be in the Rockford, Illinois area (or within a reasonable distance of it) on March 1st and 2nd, the Burpee Museum is going to be host to a paleo-festival that you won't want to miss out on. Over the course of two days there will be activities and events for both children and adults, and I have to say that the lecture program they have set up looks pretty awesome. Here's who will be speaking at the festival; Philip Currie- Chinese Theropods and Mapusaurus Jack Horner- Dinosaur Ontogenies Eva Koppelhus - Paleoenvironment of Dinosaur Provincial Jim Kirkland- Cretaceous Utah…

Photo of the Day #78: Three Tiger Cubs

I wasn't quite sure to put up here on Christmas Day, but I thought this shot of the three Philadelphia Zoo tiger cubs worked best. Indeed, I hope those of you celebrating today (or around this time of year in general) not only get what you want/need but also have the time to enjoy it, the young tiger in the center of the photograph having a little less luck in keeping his toy to himself. I have no idea how big the cubs are now (this photo was taken in September, if I recall correctly), but I shall soon see them again when I return to the Philly Zoo over break. The zoo may be home to cheetah…

Photo of the Day #52: Blastocerus

I had some amount of difficulty finding information about this animal, Blastocerus, because the plaque describing it at the AMNH called it "Blastoceros" and that was the name I attempted to look up. Once I learned of the mistake, though, much more information became available, although it was not quite what I expected. Many of the fossils I photograph and share here are of extinct representatives of animals, but Blastocerus is still around and the species Blastocerus dichotomus is a South American animal known as the Marsh Deer. Previously this deer ranged all over the South American…

Justin Fruhling wants a piece of me, too

Looks like I've got an editorial war on my hands. Yesterday I announced that my refutation of Brad Pironciak's "Social Darwinism" piece was printed in the college newspaper, The Daily Targum, and now I've received an editorial reply from English major Justin Fruhling. I don't have time to respond in full to his comments right now (you can read his piece here), but Fruhling's main complaint is that I didn't take "The Darwin Awards" or falling standardized test scores into account. Entirely missing the main point of my argument (intelligence is not wholly determined by inheritance and we should…

Too stupid for words

If you make a movie that falsely claims there's a massive conspiracy to expel dissenting voices, it's probably unwise to then expel dissenting voices. And if you are going to pass photographs around to security guards and instruct them that certain people are threats to your movie, and must be expelled, you might as well have the guards be on the lookout not only for PZ Myers, an innocuous professor from a small liberal arts college in the backwoods of Minnesota, but also for the biologist, best-selling author of numerous books, and TV star Richard Dawkins. Just on the off chance that…

Dennett on Rorty

I'm a fan of both Dennett and Rorty*, and I thought this touching anecdote from Dennett really captures a crucial difference between the two philosophers: At one three-hour lunch in a fine restaurant in Buenos Aires, we [Dennett and Rorty] traded notes on what we thought philosophy ought to be, could be, shouldn't be, and he revealed something that I might have guessed but had never thought of. I had said that it mattered greatly to me to have the respect of scientists--that it was important to me to explain philosophical issues to scientists in terms they could understand and appreciate.…

Malcolm Gladwell vs. Steve Sailer

The fight is getting pretty entertaining. While I've got my problems with Gladwell, I think his main argument in this skuffle is exactly right: As I thought should have been obvious, I don't think that the observation, or analysis, or discussion of racial differences is racist. The black-white achievement gap is real. The issue is what inferences are drawn from those observations of difference. There is enough uncertainty over what is meant by race, and enough uncertainty over what is meant by intelligence, and enough uncertainty over our ability to measure what we think is intelligence, and…

I'm for S&W, apparently

I was as surprised as anyone that according to Texas Education Agency, Josh Rosenau and Eugenie Scott of NCSE Now Support “Strengths and Weaknesses” in Texas Science Standards, but John West's response is utterly hackish: Did Rosenau and Scott misrepresent their positions in an attempt to get a better slot to speak? Or did they simply misunderstand what they were being asked? Or were TEA officials so oblivious that they somehow didn’t know that the NCSE is the leading national group opposing the teaching of strengths and weaknesses in Texas? It will be interesting to find out the truth.…

Kyle Lewallen

Texas oilman Kyle Lewallen is building toward something, I guess. He hasn't actually made an argument yet. Ah, he was on the writing committee, and is offering their suggested revisions for the Earth and Space Science TEKS. They don't like amendments offered last time around by the Board, who didn't consult their expert writing committee before mucking with the text. NCSE has been pushing simply to reverse those amendments, but the committee is offering revisions which might be easier for the Board to stomach. Dunbar and Lewallen are going back and forth over the amendments to ESS TEKS 4…

Canada wins gold, now we can ignore them again

Wait Ends as Canada Wins Gold at Home: Three men stood in the sea of red at Cypress Mountain on Sunday, their chests bare except for paint. Euphoria surrounded them, men and women, young and old, who waved Canadian flags and clanged cowbells and danced to the Black Eyed Peas. Minutes earlier, Canada had secured its first gold medal of these Winter Olympics, a men's moguls triumph from Alexandre Bilodeau in the last event on the second day of competition. It was also the first gold medal won by a Canadian in an Olympics in Canada. As Bilodeau raised his arms, his nation followed suit. "This is…

The business cycle, then and now

Two interesting graphs from Calculated Risk. The first shows that the changes in GDP seem during the last recessive are on a par with those of the early 1980s and before (though we don't know if we're in a U or V shaped recession yet, though the odds are probably more U than V right now). But the second shows that in terms of employment we may be in uncharted territory, the worst of both worlds in terms of the jobless recoveries of the shallow recessions of the 1990s and early 2000s as well as the deep declines in employment of earlier recessions. I've been hearing about the soon-to-come…

On economic growth projections

Alex Tabarrok has the back story on the infamous Paul Samuelson projections about Soviet growth. It gets interesting: Tarshis and Heilbroner were more liberal than Samuelson and McConnell but offered a more nuanced, descriptive and tentative account of the Soviet economy. Why? Levy and Peart argue that they were saved from error not by skepticism about the Soviet Union per se but rather by skepticism about the power of simple economic theories to fully describe the world in the absence of rich institutional detail. The issue can be generalized to many domains outside economics. If someone…

Which nations have state religions?

One thesis in regards to the vitality of religions is that state sponsorship tends to result in disaffection because public monopolies offer sub-standard product. In contrast, separation between the public sector and religion results in a free market of ideas which promotes vigorous diversity and competition which satisfies the tastes of all (or nearly all). Below is a map from Wikipedia which shows "state religions" by geography. I don't think I accept the predictive power of the thesis above.... How you define "state religion" can be a little sketchy, but usually it has to be privileges…

Chinese propensity to copy

No, this isn't about intellectual property issues and piracy. Whole Genome Distribution and Ethnic Differentiation of Copy Number Variation in Caucasian and Asian Populations: Although copy number variation (CNV) has recently received much attention as a form of structure variation within the human genome, knowledge is still inadequate on fundamental CNV characteristics such as occurrence rate, genomic distribution and ethnic differentiation. In the present study, we used the Affymetrix GeneChip® Mapping 500K Array to discover and characterize CNVs in the human genome and to study ethnic…

The Nintendo Wii and Antonio Damasio?

I've got a short essay on the Nintendo Wii, William James and Antonio Damasio over at seedmagazine.com. It's fun for the whole family. (And don't believe the Sony Playstation 3 hype, unless you really care about how realistically your basketball players sweat. The Wii is a much cooler system.) This is the irony of the Wii: although it can't compete with the visual realism of Sony and Microsoft, it ends up feeling much more realistic. When I was testing out the Wii, I was surprised by how the new controller completely altered my gaming experience. Because my body was forced to move as if I…

And the Best Science Book Ever Written Is...

Primo Levi's The Periodic Table, at least according to the Royal Institution in London. The shortlist Primo Levi The Periodic Table Konrad Lorenz King Solomon's Ring Tom Stoppard Arcadia Richard Dawkins The Selfish Gene Other nominations James Watson The Double Helix Bertolt Brecht The Life of Galileo Peter Medawar Pluto's Republic Charles Darwin Voyage of the Beagle Stephen Pinker The Blank Slate Oliver Sacks A Leg to Stand On All in all, not a bad list. I'd add some William James and Lewis Thomas, and replace A Leg to Stand On with An Anthropologist from Mars, and replace Brecht with…

Space and Unilateral Action

Because our foreign policy of unilateral action has worked out so well here on earth, the Bush Administration has decided that we should also apply it to the rest of the universe. Just think how many distant solar systems will welcome us as liberators! From the Washington Post: President Bush has signed a new National Space Policy that rejects future arms-control agreements that might limit U.S. flexibility in space and asserts a right to deny access to space to anyone "hostile to U.S. interests." The document, the first full revision of overall space policy in 10 years, emphasizes security…

Reality

A Muslim blogger who I am acquainted with, Tariq Nelson, has been threatened: To the coward that called from a BLOCKED NUMBER and threatened me! I HAVE CALLED the police and I am PUSHING HARD to FIND OUT WHO YOU ARE and I will prosecute to the fullest extent possible! Apparently you know of me in some way or know someone that had my phone number. I am not going to tolerate your BS for one second and I will NOT allow you to harm me or my family. I am posting here so that everyone will know that I am receiving these threats and that a phone call is too close to home. I want people to know that…

The predictable after-catastrophe story

There was a terrible plane crash in India — a plane overshot the runway and plummeted off a cliff to explode. 158 dead; 8 survived. You can guess where this is going: Koolikkunnu Krishnan, one of the survivors, chose to spit in the dead faces of all the casualties and sneer at their families. "I've been thinking, 'Why me? Why me?' And I can only think that God wanted to give me a second life," he said from his hospital bed in Mangalore. Keep this in mind, please. If you're ever in a tragic accident, and you survive while others are seriously harmed, don't claim it's because you're special…