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Counting Photons

ScienceBlogs' own Chad Orzel has on a number of occasions discussed the photon concept in relation to physics pedagogy. He thinks (as I do) that it's a good concept to teach early even though formally speaking photons are considerably more complicated than the "particle of light" idea that's often presented as an intuitive concept. But even that billiard-ball model is in a lot of ways not so far from the truth. Since we're speaking of intuition, it's worth noting that the photon model is not necessarily something that at first seems to have a lot of connection to everyday reality. When was…

Global warming + trees = regional cooling?

This morning, for the first time this year, the experts who monitor air pollution in these parts issued an "orange" alert. Folks who might have trouble breathing should minimize outdoor activity. As we live in a rural area near the leeward side of the Great Smoky Mountains, this is always a reminder of just how bad the smog from the coal-fired plants upwind of us in Tennessee and Kentucky can be. To make matters worse, a few hours after hearing that news, I came across a recently published paper in PNAS that suggests things are going to get worse if the world continues to warm. The good news…

The beginning of the end for coal?

In the past week both Canada and the UK have announced a phase-out of conventional coal-fired power plants. Could this be the beginning of the end? Are we seeing the first stages of a global moratorium? Too soon, to tell of course. But it's encouraging. First, came the British news: Any new coal-fired power stations built in Britain will have to be fitted with cutting-edge technology to capture their carbon emissions, the Government announced yesterday in a revolution in energy policy. ... As the technology is in its infancy and still unproven, new generating stations would have to be built…

George F. Will, ethics, conservatism and the future of journalism

I'm dwelling on George F. Will's latest violation of journalistic ethics because it seems to have hit a nerve. Journalists ordinarily too polite to attack another journalist for fear of appearing biased and unprofessional have broken with their habits to call Will on his misrepresentation of the mythical "global cooling" consensus of the 1970s. It's not surprising to come across sarcastic and caustic reviews in places like the Think Progress Wonk Room or TPM Muckraker. And I would have been shocked if Joe Romm hadn't blown another in his infinite supply of gaskets. But the opprobrium has…

How not to write an atheist book

Scott Aikin and Robert Talisse are coming out with a book called Reasonable Atheism, and they argued for some form of accommodationism in a recent blog entry. I left a brief comment in which I pointed out that they had misrepresented the Gnu Atheists in one section. This has prompted a rebuttal to various atheist arguments against their position, which is fine, except…well, let me show you. Here's an excerpt of their long post. Our claim, to be clear, is that the epistemic evaluation of beliefs is a task that is conceptually distinct from the epistemic evaluation of believers.  Of course, the…

Theoretical Physics Jobs. Now With Crazy Proposed Solutions!

Over at Information Processing, the bit processor, Steve, has an interesting post up about your chances of getting a faculty job in high energy theoretical physics. (In between the best posts on the financial turmoil around 1, 2, 3.) If you're a high energy theoretical physics graduate student, and don't want to get depressed today, I would recommend avoiding the post so as to keep up your illusion of safety, but if you want a good dose of reality, check it out. From the post you can see that the odds of getting a high energy theory job in physics are more close to none than even to slim…

SquInT Live Blogging - Thursday Tutorials

I've never live blogged before (well I've been alive while I've blogged, but that is different, I guess), but maybe it will make me pay more attention to the talks, so here goes nothing. Oh, and happy Hallmark(TM) Valentines day! I'll be updating these posts as the conference goes along. John Martinis led a tutorial on measuring coherence in one qubit (Rabi flopping, Ramnsey interference, lifetimes, spin echo), measuring fidelities of one qubit gates, and process tomography for one and two qubit systems. All illustrated with beautiful experimental data from his group at UCSB. Most…

More fun with Gregg

The other day I (among others) came down on Gregg Easterbrook for his poor grasp of science. Finding myself procrastinating today, I wandered over to his blog and had yet another good laugh. In a post today, he actually displays some interest in evolutionary biology. After discussing some work suggesting that wine might be able to prolong life, he gets into the evolution of longevity. I raised my eyebrows at this point, thinking perhaps he'd moved away from the muddled stuff he's written about evolution in the past. But then the goofiness returns. First he describes how experiments to extend…

Protests in Copenhagen Unlikely to Be An Effective Communication Strategy

From the Associated Press to the Guardian to Reuters to Agence France Presse,protesters and journalists create a confusing storyline focused on chaos, conflict, and law and order It's too early to say what impact the protests in Copenhagen will have on the negotiating process or on world public opinion. However, when it comes to social protest generally, past research suggests several common and powerful barriers to communication success. There are a few rare exceptions, such as the Civil Rights marches of the 1960s, but on issues such as world trade, food biotechnology, or the war in Iraq…

Video: Danes on the Future of Science Journalism

In June, I will be heading to Copenhagen to speak at and participate in the annual meeting of the Danish Science Journalists Association. The meeting titled "Framing Research" tackles many of the issues that I address in previously published and forthcoming articles, including a major article co-authored with several colleagues that is scheduled to appear around the time of the conference. [More on that in June.] As a build up to the conference, the organizers have been conducting "person in the street" interviews on key themes. One of the main topics of the conference, as featured in this…

Science Policy Not a Top of Mind Priority for Public

Now that Obama has his science and environmental policy team in place, there's great optimism for important new directions in policy. Yet it will take smart and effective communication to meaningfully engage Americans on these policies, especially in the context of an overwhelming public focus on the economy. Consider that in a WPost/ABC News poll released today, when asked in an open-ended question to name the most important problem the President and Congress should focus on, 55% named the economy, 1% named gas prices/energy, and less than 1% named greenhouse gases/global warming. When asked…

Palin's Earmarks Were For Scientific and Environmental Research

Alaskan Governor Sarah Palin might dispute the human contribution to climate change, oppose embryonic stem cell research, and promote creationism, but in other ways she has been an advocate for science. As I wrote last week, while on a few issues bi-partisan support for science breaks down, on other issues, including financing for scientific research, many Republicans are leading advocates. Palin, for example, as Governor championed several earmarks requests to fund environmental research in her state. From the Politico: Many others, though, are of exactly the sort that McCain has made a…

90% of Enviro Skeptic Books Have Think Tank Roots

If the author is skeptical of mainstream science, is there a conservative think tank behind them? A new study by a team of political scientists and sociologists at the journal Environmental Politics concludes that 9 out of 10 books published since 1972 that have disputed the seriousness of environmental problems and mainstream science can be linked to a conservative think tank (CTT). Following on earlier work by co-author Riley Dunlap and colleagues, the study examines the ability of conservative think tanks to use the media and other communication strategies to successfully challenge…

The Scientist Delusion? Nature Column on AAAS Panel

In his regular column at Nature this week, David Goldston weighs in on the themes discussed at the AAAS panel "Communicating Science in a Religious America," which Goldston moderated. In the column titled "The Scientist Delusion," Goldston notes that even very religious publics often strongly support many areas of science. To use as bogeymen and as a rallying cry "religious fundamentalists" and a "public hostile to science" doesn't make much sense and may even serve to harm the goals of promoting science in the United States. As he writes: The point here is not that there's nothing for…

Shutdown of North Atlantic Current Unlikely

You remember how in The Day After Tomorrow global warming leads to a shutdown of the Gulf Stream and catastrophic cooling of Europe. (This would be before the scene where the cold chases the kid down the hallway of the New York Public Library.) Well, just in case you didn't know, that isn't going to happen: The idea, which held climate theorists in its icy grip for years, was that the North Atlantic Current, an extension of the Gulf Stream that cuts northeast across the Atlantic Ocean to bathe the high latitudes of Europe with warmish equatorial water, could shut down in a greenhouse world…

Not an editorial I expected to read in the Christian Science Monitor

If you read the statistics, it isn't difficult to question the effectiveness of abstinence-only education in schools. It is about as effective as telling a three-year-old to not eat that big cookie on the table and then leaving the room to see what happens. However, I was under the distinct impression that there were still many people in denial of this fact -- hence my surprise when I read the following editorial in the Christian Science Monitor: It wasn't supposed to turn out this way. The abstinence-only sex-education programs on which the federal government has been spending around $176…

The shy, fragile face of ID

Over at The Panda’s Thumb there is a highly informative guest post by Dan Brooks detailing a pro-ID conference he was invited to in June of last year. After the conference, Brooks and others received an email "stating that the ID people considered the conference a private meeting,and did not want any of us to discuss it, blog it, or publish anything about it. They said they had no intention of posting anything from the conference on the Discovery Institute’s web site (the entire proceedings were recorded). They claimed they would have some announcement at the time of the publication of the…

"Pithecophobes of the World, Unite!" (Part III)

Following on from parts one and two, here is the penultimate portion of the talk. The Binaries of Creationism and The Long War To many Creationists, Darwin "merely revived ancient paganism, clothed in apparently sophisticated modern apparel, but underneath there was still the same old pantheistic materialism of antiquity", a modern day form of the "evolutionism" of the ancient Greeks, Romans, Babylonians, and others. This amalgamation of very divergent philosophies and belief-systems is highlighted by Morris' assertion that "if the universe was not created by a transcendent Creator God […

Drink Deep, or Taste Not, the Plasma Spring: How Plasma TV's Work

Ever wonder how plasma TV's work? Well, I did, and decided to figure it out! "Traditional" televisions use cathode ray tubes, in which a gun fires a beam of electrons inside a large glass tube at phosphor atoms at the other end. The electrons excite the phosphor atoms, causing them to light up as pixels. The image is produces by lighting up different areas of the phosphor coating with different colors (red, green, blue) at varying intensities. While this sort of TV produces nice images, physically they are bulky. In order to increase screen size, you have to increase the length of the…

Friday Grey Matters: An Intro to African Greys

I'm instituting a new Friday *special* here at Retrospectacle: Friday Grey Matters. While readers might think this have to do with neuroscience (and it does in a way) I'm actually going to be talking about African Grey Parrots, of which I am the proud owner on one! Sometimes it may just be observations about what Pepper does (behaviorally and linguistically) and sometimes research from the literature on these amazing birds. The first episode of Grey Matters will be an introduction to these birds, who are the best mimics in the animal kingdom. (More below the fold....) African Grey, as their…

The Ethics of Using Your Kids in an Experiment

The NYTimes has a fascinating article about MIT professors -- developmental psychologists mostly -- who use their own children's development as data in their research. Though in nearly all cases, they are studying normal child development and not doing any of potentially harmful intervention, this presents difficult ethical issues because of the dual roles as parent and as researcher: Some research methods are clearly benign; others, while not obviously dangerous, might not have fully understood effects. Ethicists said they would consider participation in some projects acceptable, even…

Ocean Life After Dark…A Pair of Steamy Shark Stories

In two tantalizing shark discoveries, scientists in Germany have learned that playing certain songs to sharks in aquariums increases their libidos. Meanwhile, a different group of scientists may have discovered the secret rendezvous spot where great white sharks go to mate. Bon-Chicka-Bow-Wow Out of sheer frustration with the lack of sexual behavior in their captive sharks, researchers in German aquariums tried playing different music to the fish, hoping that it would help put them in the mood. The same tactic has proven successful with captive panda bears and primates in the past, and lo…

Flight of the remote-controlled cyborg beetle

REMOTE-CONTROLLED insects may sound like the stuff of science fiction, but they have already been under development for some time now. In 2006, for example, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA, the Pentagon's research and development branch) launched the Hybrid Insect Micro-Electro-Mechanical Systems program, whose ultimate aim is to turn insects into unmanned aerial vehicles. Such projects provide proof of principle, but have met with limited success. Until now, that is. In the open access journal Frontiers in Integrative Neuroscience, a team of electrical engineers led by…

Nature editors, pygmys' brains, etc.

The past few days have been rather hectic, hence the lack of updates. On Saturday, I attended and took part in Europe's first science blogging conference, and there were also several other events which had been organized for those who came to the event from abroad. Last Thursday evening, I was forced to go on a scientific pub crawl, and on Friday I joined a group of about 20 others for a London science tour. Both events were organized and led by Matt Brown, who pretended that it was part of his job rather than an excuse for him to indulge in his hobbies and show off his extensive knowledge…

Making NIH Funding Part of the Election Discussion

As funding and budgets flat line at the National Institutes of Health, science organizations are hoping to make NIH funding part of the election discussion. In a smart way, they are framing the issue in terms of social progress with the catchphrase "Science Cures," making personally relevant the value of basic research. Below is a press release from FASEB announcing their new election-oriented Web site at http://sciencecures.org/. AS 2008 PRESIDENTIAL RACE HEATS UP, FASEB LAUNCHES VOTER EDUCATION INITIATIVE SCIENCECURES.ORG Bethesda, MD - The Federation of American Societies for Experimental…

Sagan: Framing shared values between science & religion

Before there was EO Wilson's breakthrough success with The Creation, there was Carl Sagan, who was a master at emphasizing the shared values between science and religion. Consider this example: According to both Sagan biographies, during the late 1980s, in advocating his "nuclear winter" hypothesis, the Cornell astronomer led a delegation of scientists to the Vatican to give a research briefing for Pope John Paul, who subsequently issued a statement against nuclear build-up. Based on the meeting's success, Sagan came away convinced of the need to emphasize the common goals between scientists…

GLOBAL WARMING TALKING POINTS: Center for American Progress Emphasizes Public Accountability Angle

With the Supreme Court deciding yesterday to hear a case challenging the Bush administration's enforcement of the Clean Air Act (Times coverage here, Post here), the Center for American Progress has issued the following Talking Points memo framing the issue of climate change around PUBLIC ACCOUNTABILITY. At issue, argues the Center, is that the Bush administration is formulating policy based on industry manipulated science. Efforts to curb greenhouse gas emissions have been stalled, despite the fact that, according to the Center's interpretation, polls show that the public wants action.…

Woodpecker Punditry--Predicted and Delivered!

On Thursday I predicted that pundits would make the rediscovery of the Ivory-billed woodpecker an opportunity to criticise predictions that humans are causing mass extinctions--while conveniently ignoring evidence that goes against their claims. Today I came across the first case I know of, which appears a short Week-in-Review piece about the woodpeckers in the New York Times. (You have to scroll down a bit to the article.) First, a conservation biologist is quoted saying that most things that scientists think are extinct are extinct. The article then ends with this: But Stephen Budiansky,…

Live World Cup Blogging

Only thirty minutes to go before the start of the World Cup Final. My prediction is 1-0 for France. We'll see ... 00:00 - France win the battle of the anthems. Obvious. 01:00 - First blood to the Italians. Henry goes down, is shaky getting up. Wont be good if he goes off. 05:13 - Penalty for France! Zidane scores! The foul seemed a little dubious, but there's nothing that can be done about it now. Teams that score first are 41-8-7 in the competition. May have to change my prediction to 2-1. 15:00 - France seem to be settling back a little and the Italians are doing all the attacking. Could…

Teaching Design

I have been teaching an upper-division course on Origins, Evolution and Creation since 1998; the course has been very popular and has been cross-listed as both Biology (BIO) and History and Philosophy of Science (HPS). Every year I get 40 or so students from varying religious and educational backgrounds and we examine the evidence for creationist claims (after spending some time thinking about the nature of science and religion). Over the years it has morphed from a course largely examining "scientific creationism" to one examining intelligent design. I'm not afraid to let the students read…

dtMRI of Long-Range Connectivity and Hemispheric Asymmetry

Yesterday I reviewed several detailed architectural asymmetries between the right and left hemispheres, but presented little information on asymmetries in long-range connectivity. Recent advances in a form of magnetic resonance imaging called "diffusion tensor MRI" have made possible whole-brain imaging of white matter tracts, which are important for long-range connectivity in the brain. So, how has this technology refined the study of hemispheric structural asymmetry? First, the basics: dtMRI analyzes the "fractional anisotropy" of water in tissue: in other words, it demonstrates the…

Remembering Historian Howard Zinn (1922-2010)

As reported this evening in the Boston Globe, the internationally renowned historian and bestselling author of A People's History of the United States died today while traveling in California. For Dr. Zinn, activism was a natural extension of the revisionist brand of history he taught. Dr. Zinn's best-known book, A People's History of the United States (1980), had for its heroes not the Founding Fathers -- many of them slaveholders and deeply attached to the status quo, as Dr. Zinn was quick to point out -- but rather the farmers of Shays' Rebellion and the union organizers of the 1930s. I…

The line between optimism and cluelessness can be a thin one, I guess...

In the past week, I've had to have some uncomfortable conversations with students. In each case, the student is failing my class. (And we're not talking barely failing....we're talking obviously failing.) In each case, the student had no idea that s/he is failing my class. The student had no idea! Even though: 1. I post grades for each student on our course management system. 2. I post how many points each assignment is worth, so the students can calculate points percentages. 3. I post the grade breakdown for the course, so the students can also, at any time, calculate their overall grade…

Hey maybe scientists should do more than just wait for their journal to issue a press release on their new fabu article

The authors thesis is that the only mandatory communication of results is in peer reviewed journal articles. Scientists aren't required to do other communicating and often leave communication to the public to the media. They ask if is this is adequate given the very low percentage of scientific articles that ever make it into the press, particularly in areas outside of health and medicine, and also given the fact that for everyone out of formal education, the media is their primary source of science education. Recent studies do show that scientists often don't mind talking to reporters and do…

Shakespeare on having children

Coincidentally, I read two contrasting poems on the same day: Shakespeare's sonnet in the Oxford book and Philip Larkin in The Nation's Favourite Twentieth Century Poems. Shakespeare's famous 12th sonnet that urges us to procreate When I do count the clock that tells the time, And see the brave day sunk in hideous night; When I behold the violet past prime, And sable curls, all silvered o'er with white; When lofty trees I see barren of leaves, Which erst from heat did canopy the herd, And summer's green all girded up in sheaves, Borne on the bier with white and bristly beard, Then of thy…

Phineas Gage in the Flesh

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…

Are we living in a neuroculture?

Andrew Carnie, Magic Forest, 2002, via Neuroculture.org   Do we live in a neuroculture? Of course we do! Coming from a blog named Neuron Culture, this is obviously a set-up question â my excuse to call attention to a post by Daniel Buchman that offers a brief review article on the question. It seems that everywhere I look nowadays, Iâm seeing images of, or reading descriptions of, the brain in some shape or form. Buchman links (at the post's bottom, as is now the practice at NCore) to several good reads and sites, including Neuroculture.org, which has some lovely stuff, and â curse those…

What sort of 'trigger' are they waiting for?

As Congress debates healthcare reform, we often hear that hopes for comprehensive reform -- fundamental changes, like a public plan or a radical, Netherlands-like overhaul of regulation -- simply aren't realistic. I hope to explore later why this seems so to those casting the votes. In the meantime, a couple reports make an interesting juxtaposition: The first reorients the context of, if not the debate, then the original reasons the subject came up. The WSJ Health Blog reports briefly on some truly alarming projections of healthcare economics 10 years from now. A sampler: In every state,…

A talk on Darwin's coral reef theory -- his first and final test

A coral atoll, from Darwin's The Structure and Distribution of Coral Reefs, 1842. For those teeming millions near Hanover, N.H., here's notice that I'll be giving a talk at Dartmouth at 4pm today -- Thu, Feb 5 -- about Darwin's first, favorite, and (to me) most interesting theory, which was his theory about how coral reefs formed. This is the subject of my book Reef Madness: Charles Darwin, Alexander Agassiz, and the Meaning of Coral, and I'll be posting more about it next week, during the Blog for Darwin festival. But the short version -- and the topic of my talk -- is this: Darwin's coral…

Carnival of Evolution #6

Hello everyone! Happy Carnival! evâoâluâtionâ [ev-uh-loo-shuhn or, especially Brit., ee-vuh-]ânoun1. A gradual process in which something changes into a different and usually more complex or better form.           Most of the time, when we think 'evolution', we think about animals and genetic diversity. Sure, we've heard the term "Chemical Evolution" thrown around a bit, too, but only about events before life began. Well, not everyone uses such a narrow definition of evolution. For example, a group of scientists claim that Rocks Evolve, Too. The international team detailed their theory of…

Stop pooping! You're killing sentient beings!

In a recent quack conference, Deepak Chopra did his usual thing: taking new science that he understands poorly and stuffing it full of magic bogosity. According to Chopra, that pesky inflamed microbiome is sentient. The genome, microbiome and epigenome, which the author collectively calls the “super gene,” are referenced throughout the interview. His book, Super Genes: The Key to Health and Well-Being, was published last year. Oh, no! Every time I use the bathroom, I am slaughtering billions of sentient beings? I'm going to have to stop pooping. …frequent criticism doesn’t seem to deter…

This Week's Sci-Fi Worthy Parasite

Most parasites are really, really small. Especially the ones that mess with brains - they tend to be able to fit in them. But not all parasites that can do some fun jedi mind tricks are so itsy-bitsy. Take, for example, the Rhizocephalans - the parasitic barnacles. Yes, I did just say parasitic barnacle. Although you probably wouldn't recognize it as a barnacle when it's an adult. The adult parasites look like a sac where a female crab would have eggs. It's classified as a barnacle, however, due to its larval forms, specifically the cypris larvae (left), which neatly place it in the class…

Why play Tetris when you can do X?

Screw Tetris. More and more research seems to be accumulating to support MDMA (or Ecstasy, to the street-wise reader) for the treatment of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) MDMA, or 3,4-methylenedioxy-N-methylamphetamine, is well-loved by drug enthusiasts for its experiential effects which include feelings of intimacy, lack of fear or anxiety, and, of course, the feeling of euphoria it is named for. It does this by increasing oxytocin in the brain, a hormone which is otherwise released after orgasm, dopamine, and 'stress hormones' like noradrenaline and cortisol. Though its mechanism isn'…

Lasker Awards 2006

This year's recipients of the Lasker Awards were announced yesterday. These awards from The Lasker Foundation are often referred to as the "American Nobels." The award for Basic Medical Research went to three scientists for "the prediction and discovery of telomerase, a remarkable RNA-containing enzyme that synthesizes the ends of chromosomes, protecting them and maintaining the integrity of the genome." Elizabeth H. Blackburn (UC-San Francisco) Carol W. Greider (Johns Hopkins) Jack W. Szostak (Harvard) Most cancer researchers, biochemists, and cell biologists know all three of these…

ScienceBlogs: The Choice of a New Generation?

A few of you might have noticed that there's a new blog here at ScienceBlogs - one that does not exactly seem to be receiving a warm welcome. Pepsico - the makers of much of the sugary caffeinated goodness that gets me through the day - seems to have managed to purchase a blog here. (Contrary to popular belief, that's not actually the strategy I employed to get my slot. I don't have corporate pockets, so I went with "beg and grovel" instead.) For obvious reasons, having a corporation blogging about their products at Sb raises some concerns about things like conflicts of interest, the…

Olympus Mons

We're pretty familiar with hotspot volcanoes on earth. A rising plume of magma reaches to the crust, creating a volcano. The magma plumes can that cause the hotspots stay in the same spot for tens of millions of years, but plate tectonics works to keep the crust moving above the plume. The result is a series of volcanoes, with a small number of active volcanoes over the hotspot, at the end of a line of extinct volcanoes that trace the plate's movement. The Hawaiian Islands are the classic example of this process on earth. In this Google Earth view, the Big Island of Hawaii (at the…

Watching the Inauguration

I'm watching the inauguration on tv...all the bigwigs are walking in...and here comes Malia and Sasha. Could those girls possibly be any cuter? Every time they show a shot of the sea of humanity on the Mall I am just overwhelmed. I've never had a sense of living through anything so momentous before.* Yay for us! The Bush years are over! *except the election, of course. Well, and 9/11. But that was a very different sense of momentous. UPDATE: Feinstein just gave her speech and tears are rolling down my cheeks. That line about the dream begun at the steps of the Lincoln Memorial…

It's That Time Of Year Again

The National Academy of Sciences has announced its latest crop of members, and there are 16 - count 'em! 16! - women out of the 72 elected. The Chronicle of Higher Education spins this positively with the headline "16 Women Elected to National Academy of Science" and the following opening: The National Academy of Sciences announced today the election of 72 new members, including 16 women. That's a significant reversal from just one year ago, when only nine women were inducted, the fewest since 2001. The record year remains 2005, when 19 women were elected. The academy, most of whose members…

The Origin of "Puke On His Shoes"

Longtime Zuskateers know that I often recommend, or express the desire to engage in, puking upon someone's shoes when they have behaved in an egregious manner. Perhaps you have occasionally wondered whence came this delightful phrase. A thousand years ago, when I was still a graduate student in Boston, I went to visit a friend of mine in D.C. On the long train trip back to Boston, a suited gentleman (and I use the term very loosely) sat down next to me somewhere around Baltimore. I was deeply engrossed in a novel, but this moron didn't care. He interrupted my reading with a steady…

The Discovery Institute, Casey Luskin, "Judicial Activism", and Blatant Hypocrisy

One of the joys of procrastination is that sometimes if you wait long enough, someone else really will take care of things. I mention that because Ed Brayton just did a good job dismantling Casey Luskin's latest whine about how big bad Judge Jones was such a nasty judicial activist for daring to issue a ruling in the Dover, PA Intelligent Design case that addressed the question of whether or not ID is good science. I was planning a long and detailed post on the same thing, but now all that I have to do is highlight one point that Ed didn't make in his post. As Ed points out, there were a…