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"Science in the Public Forum" Ira Flatow on Atheists Talk, October 24, 2010

Where is Science in the Public Forum Heading? It's time for a discussion! Most know Ira Flatow as a science journalist, producer, and as the host of "Science Friday," broadcast on National Public Radio (NPR) every Friday afternoon. But did you know about his Minnesota connection? He was the original host and writer for the Emmy award winning "Newton's Apple," which broadcast from the television studios at KTCA in St. Paul, Minnesota. Science communicators Greg Laden and Lynn Fellman will ask Ira about the major changes in delivering science news and the effectiveness of new media for science…

Someday, Cosmopolitan will ask me to write a piece on beauty tips, too

My opinion of Wired magazine just dropped a couple of notches. They've got Gregg Easterbrook pontificating on a science issue, the origin of life. Easterbrook is a sports writer with absolutely no clue about science—I've commented on his incompetence a few times before (OK, more than a few times). This time he's soberly stating that no one has done any research on abiogenesis since Miller/Urey, or what they've done is a series of failed experiments, and that there are no hints in nature about the chemical origins of life, therefore, maybe a god did it … while completely oblivious to the fact…

Keep your head down. Don't make me remind you to keep your head down. Keep it down.

Sherlock Holmes news: Stephen Fry, who played IIRC the psychiatrist on Bones who treated Seeley Booth after he shot the clown off the ice cream truck in a conniption of annoyance, will play Mycroft in the second Guy Ritchie Holmes adaptation (with Robert Downey Jr and Jude Law) due out in December 2011. Excellent choice. Delta Airline 5951 required an emergency landing last night due to faulty wheels. Here is a video of the event from inside the cockpit: I've never heard a flight attendant do that. I hope someone slapped her and the person who thought of the idea of doing that and the…

Igor and Lisa

Igor is on the cusp of being a hurricane and not being a hurricane. The storm has hurricane force winds but its energy is being rapidly redistributed from a cyclonic pattern (a hurricane is a cyclone) to a frontal pattern (a hurricane is not a front). Either way, somebody's gonna lose themselves' a trailer. In Newfoundland. Maybe. Lisa, still in the eastern Atlantic, is now a tropical storm, as predicted. But, the next several days have a great deal of uncertainty regarding Lisa's direction of movement and intensity. I'm thinking Lisa will not be a any time over the next four days, but…

Before and after public pressure

Before: Irish science minister boosts antievolution blarney The Irish minister of state for science is to appear at a launch party for a self-published antievolutionist book, according to the Irish Times (September 13, 2010). Conor Lenihan, who represents Dublin South West for Fianna Fáil in Dáil Ãireann (the lower house of the Irish parliament) and serves as Minister of State for Science, Technology, Innovation, and Natural Resources, is billed as launching John J. May's The Origin of Specious Nonsense (Dublin: Original Writing, 2010) at a September 15, 2010, event in Dublin. (source,…

Man Thru History

I was asked my opinion of this strangely engrossing drawing titled "Man Thru History". It's one of those huge multi-paneled works with lots of little details that draw your eye in—I looked everywhere for Waldo but couldn't find him. Anyway, here's one panel out of 23: While the details are fun to pore over, I can't say that I'm impressed with it overall. There are too many distortions. Start with the title: "Man thru history". That's actually accurate, in a sense. It's an illustration of a particular man's perception of history. While most of the figures are just standing, men are either…

Parasite threatens many of Britain's best-loved birds

Emerging infectious diseases do not only affect humans. Wildlife is threatened as well, and an alarming report from Britain documents an avian tragedy of great proportions. Emerging protozoan caused diseases are seriously affecting British populations of Carduelis chloris, the greenfinch, and and chaffinch Fringilla coelebs, a chaffinch, two of Britian's most common birds. The offending organism is a new and fatal disease first found in Britain's finches in 2005, Trichomonas gallinae. Within two years of its appearance, greenfinch breeding populations ad decreased by 35%, and chaffinch…

Final Report of The National Academies' Human Embryonic Stem Cell Research Advisory Committee

... and 2010 Amendments to The National Academies' Guidelines for Human Embryonic Stem Cell Research: In 2005, the National Academies released the book, Guidelines for Human Embryonic Stem Cell Research, which offered a common set of ethical standards for a field that, due to the absence of comprehensive federal funding, was lacking national standards for research. In order to keep the Guidelines up to date, given the rapid pace of scientific and policy developments in the field of stem cell research, the Human Embryonic Stem Cell Research Advisory Committee was established in 2006 with…

Every time a skeptic tells a lie, a blog somewhere dies

Just so you know, this post led to this meltdown. And, for the record, as I say in my first comment on that blog post, it is incorrect, absurd, offensive, and stupid to suggest that I linked a name of an author to that blog. No such thing happened. William, the blogger of YNH, who previously claimed to be a group of three or four people from the upper midwest including one female who is actually a 23 year old graduate student in Alabama, is what we call in the business one sick puppy. Feel free to go to his confessional blog post and join others who are encouraging him to keep blogging.…

Words with consequences

Mark Madden ESPN shock jock jock Mark Madden made the following remarks on his radio show the other day: I'm very disappointed to hear that Senator Ted Kennedy of Massachusetts is near death because of a brain tumor. I always hoped Senator Kennedy would live long enough to be assassinated. ... and thus, got his own ugly ass fired. [source] Sharon Stone Sharon Stone, famous actress, made some remarks too. She suggested last week that the devastating May 12 earthquake in China could have been the result of bad karma over the government's treatment of Tibet... "I'm not happy about the…

Oh Crap, What are we Gonna Do Now?

This is the first time we are forced to weather a major storm in the Twin Cities without Paul Douglas! We're doomed!!!! This storm is supposed to go for another 24 hours or so. I am reminded of last spring when there was a particularly bad storm raging outside... ... and Amanda and I had the TV on with Paul showing all the cool radar signals and telling people what was going to happen next. Suddely, he zoomed in on our neighborhood, had a look at the radar, and got a very worried look on his face. He turned to us and said "If you're in Blaine or Coon Rapids right now, go to the…

Today Britney Spears, Tomorrow Joe Schmo

A number of staff of a Los Angeles Hospital will likely lose their jobs for reading Britney Spears' medical records. The Los Angeles Times says workers at the UCLA medical centre looked at Spears' confidential files when she was admitted to the hospital in January. Jeri Simpson, the hospital's head of human resources, confirmed to the AP news agency that several staff would be disciplined or fired over the incident. "It's very frustrating and it's very disappointing," she said. According to the Los Angeles Times, 13 staff - none of them doctors - will lose their jobs. [source] It is very…

Grammar Nazis

Sometimes I complain on this blog about grammar Nazis. I had no idea at the time that grammar Nazis might actually be a real phenomenon. Of course, I'd be dead because my unedited material all too frequently contains multiple run-on sentences. True, I almost always find them later when I reread my posts and then fix them, but in the few hours after such posts "go live" they often sit there, uncorrected. Oh, well, it is blogging, and I don't have an editor other than myself. Now watch: Based on this video, everybody's favorite anti-vaccine apologist who keeps reminding us he is not "anti-…

A little quackademic medicine in Texas

Calling all Texas skeptics! Well, at least Texas skeptics who can find their way to Galveston on March 29. The reason? Well, the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston is hosting the Nicholson Round-table Integrative Lecture Series: "Complementary and integrative medicine in cancer care -- What does the evidence show?" will be presented by Dr. Moshe A. Frenkel, founder of the integrative oncology clinic at M.D. Anderson Cancer Center. He will be joined by panelists Dr. Avi B. Markowitz, chief of the division of hematology/oncology and head of the office of oncology clinical trials at…

Australian Lungfish update

I just received word from Per Ahlberg that the status of the Australian lungfish conservation efforts have reached a critical phase: letters are needed NOW. Here's the situation: The Traveston Dam proposal has moved into a new and critically important phase: it has been referred to the Federal Environment Minister (Mr Ian Campbell) for consideration under the Federal Environmental Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act. Ian Campbell has the power to stop the dam, but if he doesn't it is unlikely that any other organisation or individual will be able to do so. The first hurdle that must…

Discover: Why Does the Vaccine/Autism Controversy Live On?

Unfortunately, Orac has been feeling a bit under the weather since last night--so much so that he actually did something he rarely does and stayed home from work. But enough with the third person schtick. If I feel better later, maybe I'll post something. Hopefully I'll be back to 100% tonight and can produce the usual Insolence that readers know and expect for tomorrow. Right now I can't say. What I can say, however, that, whatever I post, at least today it won't be about Jenny McCarthy's and J.B. Handley's appearance on The Doctors yesterday. My gastrointestinal status is tenuous enough as…

September 11, 2001: What we saw and as it happened

Once again we come to another September 11. It's hard to believe that it's been eight years since that horrible day. On this day, traditionally, I do two things. First, I post the following video. This video was shot by Bob and Bri, who in 2001 lived in a high rise a mere 500 yards from the North Tower. On this eighth anniversary of the September 11 attacks, I think it's important to post this again. It is the most prolonged and continuous video of the attack that I have seen, and, as such, It is difficult to watch. That's why it's so important to watch. Second, I either repost or post a…

Better late than never

I'm on the road for the weekend, and Internet access will likely be spotty until sometime Monday afternoon. Does that mean Orac has abandoned his readers? O ye of little faith! Of course not! There are scheduled posts in the meantime; that is, assuming that ScienceBlog's post scheduling feature doesn't let me down. Lately, it's been--shall we say?--rather less than reliable. So if my scheduled posts don't show up or, as seems to be more common, don't show up until hours after they were originally scheduled, it's not my fault. Really. They're there. First up, never let it be said that I've…

The 76th Meeting of the Skeptics' Circle: A dish brush?

As regular readers of the Skeptics' Circle know, hosts are usually given pretty wide latitude about how they handle the presentation of the posts. This time around, host Martin Rundkvist, who's hosted an excellent edition before (albeit with a puzzling theme), decides that a large dish brush is just the thing for the 76th Meeting of the Skeptics' Circle. Why? Who knows? It must be a Swedish thing. Fortunately, the carnival is chock full of bloggy goodness (albeit with one exception that somehow found its way in there) in a fine, no-nonsense (other than the brush) presentation and thus well…

Deja Clue

PZ Myers writes Time's former "Blog of the Year," the execrable PowerLine blog with which I share a state, has done it again: said something so stupid and so palpably false that I'm feeling a bit embarrassed about ragging on Oklahoma in my previous post--I should feel ashamed by association at being a Minnesotan. Check out Deltoid: down is up in the world of the Hindrocket. I feel PZ's pain. I share a state with Tim Blair, who has now made exactly the same blunder as Hindrocket: "Al Gore's Gaia love story suckered the coasts, but is now slowly fading". We'll see a correction from Blair…

Singer accepts Flat Earth Award

The Christian Science Monitor has published Fred Singer's acceptance speech after he won the 'Flat Earth Award'. This paragraph is interesting: What matters are facts based on actual observations. And as long as weather satellites show that the atmosphere is not warming, I cannot put much faith into theoretical computer models that claim to represent the atmosphere but contradict what the atmosphere tells us. [Editor's note: Satellite measurements indicate the lower atmosphere is warming at a rate of 0.12 degrees F. per decade.] A computer model is only as good as the assumptions fed into it…

Clueless is as clueless does

This book review by Matt Taibi of Thomas Friedman's The World is Flat is brilliantly funny. Go read it. Taibi's review has been widely linked and praised by bloggers but I have found a blogger who didn't like it---John Ray, who wrote about it: But reading these diatribes of rage and hate does certainly explain the horrors that happen when Leftists gain unrestricted power (i.e. in Communist regimes). My guess as to why Ray didn't like it goes like this: Before Ray can fit a piece of writing into his worldview, he needs to decide whether it was written by a Leftist or not. In this case,…

London Howlerfest and Pharynguloid Fair

There is a tradition among the regulars of the usenet group talk.origins to have occasional gatherings, usually at some major locus of evolutionary activity, and accompanied by beer. Such an event will be happening this Saturday, in London. We'll be meeting on these steps at 2pm: That's the Natural History Museum here in Kensington. Look for the bearded nerd with a black computer bag and a camera hanging from his neck; that's me. I'll be there with a distinguished and professorial science nerd scholar*; that'll be Laurence Moran. We'll hang about the steps for a while, gathering together any…

Monckton's fantasy world

William Connolley provides an example of Christopher Monckton telling a fib. I have another example. In Monckton's letter to Senators Snowe and Rockefeller, he writes: Finally, you may wonder why it is that a member of the Upper House of the United Kingdom legislature, wholly unconnected with and unpaid by the corporation that is the victim of your lamentable letter, should take the unusual step of calling upon you as members of the Upper House of the United States legislature either to withdraw what you have written or resign your sinecures. But Viscount Monckton of Brenchley is not a…

Lott vs Levitt over. Or maybe not.

David Glenn, in the Chronicle of Higher Education reports that the Lott-Levitt lawsuit has been provisionally settled: The letter of clarification, which was included in today's filing, offers a doozy of a concession. In his 2005 message, Mr. Levitt told Mr. McCall that "it was not a peer-refereed edition of the Journal." But in his letter of clarification, Mr. Levitt writes: "I acknowledge that the articles that were published in the conference issue were reviewed by referees engaged by the editors of the JLE. In fact, I was one of the peer referees." Mr. Levitt's letter also concedes that…

Lancet Links

Daniel Davies was on the radio talking about the Lancet study. Richard Miniter interviews Gilbert Burnham. Deena Beasley reports what experts in cluster sampling think of the study: "Over the last 25 years, this sort of methodology has been used more and more often, especially by relief agencies in times of emergency," said Dr. David Rush, a professor and epidemiologist at Tufts University in Boston. ... Rush, speaking at a meeting in Los Angeles on the medical consequences of the Iraq war, said that the relatively small size of the sample -- 1,849 households -- doesn't change the findings,…

I feel so honored

Sometimes there are things that happen when blogging. You get accolades from unexpected sources, little ego boosts that make it all worthwhile. Such a thing happened yesterday, on the basis of my little blurb mentioning Skeptico's takedown of Hank Barnes's misuse of logical fallacies. The reaction, as reflected in the comments in Hank's blog, was quite hilarious. One reader whined: Whenever somebody claims to be debunking something, it always means that somebody revealed an uncomfortable truth and now they've got to stuff it back in the bottle. Well no, actually, the only thing "uncomfortable…

The Australian wins another award for its War on Science

Congratulations to Chris Mitchell, editor of The Australian who has won an award from the Australian Petroleum Production & Exploration Association for journalism that promotes their interests: In congratulating Chris Mitchell, APPEA's Chief Executive Belinda Robinson observed that "over the past twelve months The Australian's in-depth coverage of a range of public policy issues affecting Australia's upstream oil and gas industry has been of a consistently high standard. The reporting has been thoughtful, balanced, analytical, well researched and a big effort was made to ensure that all…

New Scientist on AAPOR censure

Debora Mackenzie, in the New Scientist reports on the AAPOR censure: AAPOR charges that by refusing "to answer even basic questions" about data and methods, Burnham is preventing other researchers from evaluating his conclusions. According to New Scientist's investigation, however, Burnham has sent his data and methods to other researchers, who found it sufficient. A spokesman for the Bloomberg School of Public Health at Johns Hopkins, where Burnham works, says the school advised him not to send his data to AAPOR, as the group has no authority to judge the research. The "correct forum", it…

Monckton reckons Gore is the successor to Hitler, Stalin and Mao

Good old Christopher Monckton speaking at the Global Warming Denial Conference According to Monckton, the movement behind global warming alarmism can be traced to some ugly things, and being wrong about it could have a grave impact on humanity. "I think the question you're asking is who's behind the scare," Monckton said. "There's been a long history of scares recently and scientific frauds of various kinds. It began, I suppose, with the eugenics movement in the 1930s which led to Hitler. It followed on with the Lysenko movement in Russia under Stalin. It went on with the great leap back…

Overington tries to bully blogger

I don't know whether it's that the Australian just hires journalists with really thin skins or that the water there contains some skin thinning chemical, but they always seem to overreact to criticism. The latest is from Caroline please preference Malcolm Overington. You see, Gam blogged about Overington's "only joking" endorsement of Malcolm Turnbull with this comment: How did she manage to type that with the Member for Wentworth's member in her mouth? Overington didn't seem to get the joke because she phoned Gam and tried to bully him into removing the statement and even threatened to sue…

Woo World Self Treater

Via The Second Sight, I find an example of a tool that, I suspect, many alties will find highly useful: The Woo World Self Treater. It'll allow you to diagnose yourself free from the boot of big pharma and the oppressive evidence-based medicine that close-minded "conventional" doctors like me advocate. My results are below the fold: Quantum-consciousness analysis of your auric field shows you are suffering the symptoms of Temporomandibular Joint Disorder, which is commonly seen among males born under the sign of Leo. This may also be due to alien implants. Magnet therapy has been shown to be…

A newfound respect for David Copperfield

I always thought that David Copperfield was a bit cheesy. Heck, I still do. But this incident gives me a bit of respect for him: WEST PALM BEACH, Florida (AP) -- One of three teenagers charged with attempting to rob illusionist David Copperfield as he left a performance has pleaded guilty. Terrance Riley, 17, was sentenced Thursday to two years in prison for three counts of robbery with a weapon and one count of attempted robbery. He will be housed with other inmates under the age of 21. Circuit Judge Edward Garrison also ordered Riley to testify against his two co-defendants, his brother…

David Karoly - talk on climate change in Sydney, Monday 11 October

David Karoly is giving a free talk on climate change in Sydney on 11 October. Details: Climate change: Do you want the good news or the bad news? Professor David Karoly will separate the truth from the spin on climate change, telling it how it is. There are fascinating good-news stories about real world solutions that have already been implemented, globally, in Australia and in other countries. But how far do we have to go to avoid dangerous climate change? What is Australia's fair contribution to a global response on climate change? How bad might climate change get if we decide to continue…

Leakegate roundup

Coverage of the Leakegate scandal is spreading. Media Lens has published a media alert about the disinformation about climate science being published by British newspapers. Leake, as the worst offender, gets special mention. They quote James Hansen: "The media have done a great disservice to the public. This mess should be cleared up in the next year or so, although the damage may linger a while, because some people who paid attention to sensationalism may not bother with accurate explanations of the truth. The impression left from this affair is that there are some parts of the media that…

My theme song?

When the test fits my interests, I cannot resist a fellow ScienceBlogger (although I did manage to resist this particular meme that's been spreading through our little community). Like a lemming, compelled by Grrlscientist, I answer: Your Theme Song is Comfortably Numb by Pink Floyd "There is no pain, you are receding. A distant ship's smoke on the horizon. You are only coming through in waves." You haven't been feeling a lot lately, and you think that's a good thing. The comfortable part is nice... but you should really work on numb. What's Your Theme Song? A little bit scary,…

Libby, MT, Asbestos Central

I saw a good documentary on Libby MT (the town that got pummled with asbestos from the surrounding vermeculite mines) last night on PBS's P.O.V. program. You should check it out, there are rebroadcasts in most areas for taping it. Check it out here: P.O.V. What happend in Libby is really a good learning tale for two reasons: 1) It shows how evil corporations can be and how the employees can be blinded to that fact 2) It shows how toothless the EPA is when a company really wants to butt heads. 3) It shows how easy it is to forget the impact on people's lives when you aren't seeing them or…

Unholy Business: A True Tale of Faith, Greed and Forgery in the Holy Land by Nina Burleigh

This book review was originally posted by GrrlScientist on Living the Scientific Life. tags: book review, Unholy Business, religious antiquities, biblical antiquities, fraud, Christianity, Judaism, Nina Burleigh There are two different types of people in the world, those who want to know, and those who want to believe. -- Friedrich Nietzsche In November 2002, an ancient carved limestone burial box designed to hold the disarticulated skeleton of a dead person was put on public display in Canada's Royal Ontario Museum. Although common throughout Israel, this particular box, known as an…

Nazi zombies are preparing to invade the United States

Back in December, I pointed out a Norwegian movie that the Hitler Zombie definitely approves of: Dead Snow (or Død Snø in Norwegian). After all, how can you go wrong with Nazi zombies in a remote, snow bound area in Norway attacking the usual bunch of hapless but beautiful young people? I don't know about you, but that's all I ask for in a movie, even if I have to read subtitles or put up with dubbing. Good news, fans of Nazi zombies! After a successful run at Sundance, Død Snø has a U.S. distribution deal: U.S. rights to Tommy Wirkola's "Dead Snow" have been acquired by IFC Films.…

Bill Maher on Christine Maggiore's book

Last week, I did multiple posts about the death of HIV/AIDS denialist Christine Maggiore of what for all the world looked like an HIV-related pneumonia, the excuses HIV/AIDS denialists made to try to persuade people that it wasn't AIDS, and the attempted coverup of damning posts. In the past, I've also taken a certain comedian by the name of Bill Maher to task for his antivaccine views, germ theory denialism, and embrace of detoxification quackery and conspiracy mongering about big pharma. I should have known that wasn't all. I should have realized that he would be sympathetic to HIV/AIDS…

Friday Fractal XII

I thought I'd do today's fractal a little backwards. I usually begin with a fractal, then show a matching picture from nature, and explain a bit of the science behind the nature. This time, I'm going to start off with a nature photo, and follow with the fractals. Everyone should be familiar with the science behind rainbows, so I'll let the simple beauty of the image speak for itself: And a similar fractal: The Mandlebrot set might not be quite as simple, although the formula used to create it sounds simple enough: Z = Z2 + C But the art found within the set can be deeply complex and…

Darwin's autobiography - today's quotes

I'll keep quoting as I read through. Don't want to add anything myself and sully the experience of reading Darwin. I have heard my father and elder sisters say that I had, as a very young boy, a strong taste for long solitary walks; but what I thought about I know not. I often became quite absorbed, and once, whilst returning to school on the summit of the old fortifications round Shrewsbury, which had been converted into a public foot-path with no parapet on one side, I walked off and fell to the ground, but the height was only seven or eight feet. Nevertheless the number of thoughts which…

DOJ Withdraws ADA Changes That Would Ban Non-Canine Service Animals

The Department of Justice has withdrawn its proposed ADA regulations that would have banned the use of assistance monkeys, birds, miniature horses, etc.   This was in response to a memo from Obama's Chief of Staff directing all agencies to hold off on any new regulations until they could be reviewed and approved by Obama's administration.  So for now, the ADA definition of service animal remains as it has been since it's original creation, which means it still includes all species of animals.  One commenter here pointed out that for those concerned about this issue, now would be a good…

Genes for music aptitude?

Really?! Come on... Molecular and statistical genetic studies in 15 Finnish families have shown that there is a substantial genetic component in musical aptitude. Musical aptitude was determined using three tests: a test for auditory structuring ability (Karma Music test), and the Seashore pitch and time discrimination subtests. The study represents the first systematic molecular genetic study that aims in the identification of candidate genes associated with musical aptitude. The identified regions contain genes affecting cell extension and migration during neural development. Interestingly…

Linkfest: world oceans day

Much of the celebration of World Oceans Day focuses on the ocean's importance as an ecosystem, especially in relation to climate change. But the bottom of the ocean is still relatively unknown - I've been told by marine geologists that we know the topography of Venus better than that of our own planet, because we know so little of the ocean floor. The little that we learned before the late 1960's transformed the understanding of geology on land, as well - if it weren't for exploration of the oceans, we wouldn't know about plate tectonics. So in honor of World Oceans Day, I give you links to…

The Catholic Church retreats into the darkness, again

George Coyne, the Vatican astronomer, has been sacked. Red State Rabble and John Wilkins speak out on it. They cite one source condescendingly claiming that Coyne "appointed himself an expert in evolutionary biology," while Bruce Chapman of the Discovery Institute (speaking of unqualified gits appointing themselves the status of 'expert') calls Coyne an "evangelizing Darwinist," and blames his fall on his radical theology. It seems to me that Coyne was actually a highly qualified scientist who was well-informed about the general principles of science, and who informed the Vatican about the…

WoW Taxonomy II: Ailurus

I had to do it. With the red panda (Ailurus fulgens) at the top of my favorite animals list, I had to know exactly how many folks share enough interest in the firefox to name their toon after its genus name. So how many Ailuruses are there out there? Seven on the North American servers and three on the European; appropriately, six of them are druids (cat/bear forms). The highest level (and she's leveled in the past few days, so is active) is a 68 feral druid who must have just recently snagged her Staff of Beasts from the Ring of Blood quest series in Nagrand. If you've kept up with TVG,…

Reserpine (Depressing antihypertension medication)

An aromatic ring, two carbons, and a nitrogen will get you a lot of places.From hallucinogens to decongestants to speed, the arylethylamine moiety works because it tickles neurotransmitter receptors. The effects of the assorted monoamine neurotransmitters are as varied as those of the drugs that mimic it - hypertensive, euphoriant, the works. This is part of how we try to explain to ourselves how antidepressants that block the breakdown of these neurotransmitters (MAO inhibitors) or their reuptake (SSRIs) might be working. What might happen if you took something that depleted some of those…

Mercury Fulminate (Not to be carried around in one pound sacks)

As a commenter surmised in my entry on phosphine, I really like Breaking Bad. The main character is a chemist, and the writers have done a good job of working a lot of chemical tidbits into the mix (even ones not about methamphetamine, which drives much of the plot). Now through Friday: molecules from Breaking Bad that aren't methamphetamine (or even related to it) (spoilers inside). With pressure or friction, it will explosively decompose into nitrogen, carbon monoxide, and mercury metal. Mercury fulminate made an appearance in last Sunday's episode. He takes a giant sack of the stuff into…

Ionone (You're turning violet, Violet!)

It is no secret that I enjoy smelly compounds... a lot. Here's a short list of what I seem to have covered at this blog (hits for "stinky" or "smell"). I'm sure I missed some I've already written up. If I haven't covered your favorite, post a request! Stinky: Tosyl Chloride Triethylammonium Acetate Ammonium Carbonate Piperidine p-Dichlorobenzene Putrescine Dimethyl Sulfide Beta-Mercaptoethanol Thionyl Chloride Nice-smelling (or at least inoffensive): Ethyl Thiolactate Grapefruit Mercaptan Hexen-3-al 2-propionyl-1-pyrroline Muscone Acetophenone Isoamyl Acetate Furfuryl Mercaptan Ethyl…