humor
clock | March 26, 2007...yet even at the start of it, back in March 2003, The Onion understood the dynamics of war and the psychology of defenders of war better than almost half of Americans and all of GOP today.
[Hat-tip, commenter Lindsey]
integrityofscience | March 26, 2007It's taking all weekend to sort through everything that happened last week, a banner one if you're concerned about scientific integrity. Thankfully, we can stream the past.
The biggest science integrity news of the week had to be the House Committee on Government and Reform's continued investigation on political interference with climate science. From Chairman Waxman's opening comments:
Since our first hearing on January 30, we have received over eight boxes of documents from the White House Council on Environmental Quality. The document production is not yet complete. But some of the…
oracknows | March 25, 2007Worst visual pun ever below the fold?
You be the judge:
I pity the fool who doesn't think that's funny!
(Hat tip: The Daily Weird)
oracknows | March 25, 2007You be the judge...
Personally, I don't know if I could trust anyone that much.
(Hat tip: Attuworld.)
oracknows | March 24, 2007Regular readers will know my opinion of Reiki or "energy healing." No need to rehash it here, at least not at the moment. But if you're a believer and looking for a Reiki practitioner, Reiki Blogger has some suggestions for you of things that "are NOT OK" in a first Reiki session:
I recently read what I can only say was a very disturbing account of a persons first ever reiki session. The person went along to a "friends" husband who was, as well as a reiki person, a medical doctor.
Now, you would expect to be reasonably confident to follow this persons instructions. Well, think again. He asked…
grrlscientist | March 23, 2007
Bush's head may be hard, but his brains are complete mush.
.
tags: Bush, politics, humor
mikethemadbiologist | March 23, 2007...never mess with the Jewish grandmothers (Intelligent Designer man, what were you thinking?). Wednesday, Sen. Boxer smacked around Republican senator Inhofe but good:
(wait for the 1:15 mark)
No one ever listens to the Mad Biologist...
mementomori | March 23, 2007[Editor's Note: We haven't heard from him, but we're sure the C. O. is having a jolly time on his spring break.]
The Sales Pitch, Part II - Please Release Me, Let Me Go
As we pick up the story, our main character had just found himself trapped in his office by a feisty pharmaceutical representative eager to pierce his eardrums with a long-bow full of crisp, well-rehearsed questions designed to match the creases of her black suit.
What was this amazing product that must be seen to be believed, if not purchased by all? Let's set the scene, just like they do on those intellectually…
terrasig | March 22, 2007By now you've heard about the recent death of Larry (Bud) Melman, the old Late Night With David Letterman character whose real name was Calvert DeForest (NYT obituary).
In an intellectual property dispute, NBC claimed ownership of the Larry (Bud) Melman name, even though it had been devised by a "Letterman" writer, Merrill Markoe. From the moment his face appeared as the center of the CBS eye logo on the debut CBS show, Mr. DeForest used his own name. He parlayed his "Letterman" fame into other film roles and commercials for a wide range of companies including M.C.I., Honda, Cheerios and…
vhughes | March 22, 2007
This time around, the 3.14 Interview tackles the "excessively outspoken and sardonic" Steinn Sigurdsson of Dynamics of Cats.
What do you do when you're not blogging?
Paperwork—proposals, forms and occasional actual research papers; herding and tending of kids and cats; in between I read and sleep, in that order.
What is your blog called?
Dynamics of Cats
What's up with that name?
Well, in about 1993, a colleague at CERN sent me an e-mail with a "heads-up" on this new network protocol called http, a significant improvement on previous distributed data protocols. He also said this group at…
evolvingthoughts | March 21, 2007
I can't believe I didn't think of this first:
Customer: Hello. I wish to complain about this so-called 'scientific theory' what I purchased not half an hour ago from this very establishment.
Salesman: Oh yes, 'Intelligent Design'. What, uh... what's wrong with it?
Customer: I'll tell you what's wrong with it, my lad. Its vacuous, that's what's wrong with it!
Salesman: No, no, uh... what we need now is to 'teach the controversy'...
Customer: Look matey, I know an empty 'argument from incredulity' when I see one, and I'm looking at one right now.
Salesman: No, no, it's not empty: it's just…
pharyngula | March 21, 2007
Every once in a while, a reader sends me a link to something I've already dealt with (and that's OK, I don't expect everyone to have committed the entirety of the Pharyngula database to memory), but it's a link to something so dang weird it's worth reposting. In this case, I was sent a link to a page that purports to describe the beliefs of some Jehovah's Witnesses about cats, where among many other jaw-dropping arguments, it gives us this jewel:
Indeed, modern studies of classification of cats, while not necessarily being reliable as they may be based on the discredited 'theory' of…
vhughes | March 21, 2007
After a bit of a hiatus, ScienceBlogger interviews are back! And today, in honor of his one-year blogging anniversary, we feature Steve Higgins of Omni Brain.
What's your name?
James Stephen Higgins, but that James name is one of those crazy family things where every first-born male gets the name and every other one goes by their middle name—so I guess I'm the every other one. Steve is the short answer.
What's your blog called?
Omni Brain
What's up with that name?
There used to be this great sciency magazine (back in elementary school) called OMNI, published by the guy who publishes Hustler…
mementomori | March 21, 2007[Editor's note: While the narrator is off enjoying spring break in an balmy undisclosed location he asked us to reprint some of his old posts. We had actually planned to lease this space to a more intellectual project in his absence but when he gave us those Bambi eyes we relented. So here he is once again.]
The Sales Pitch (originally posted in May, 2005)
I let out a zephyr of relief as I guided the ol' Model T into the doctor's parking lot: another harrowing trip on the crash-test roadway known as my route to work had ended without me being extracted feet first by the jaws of life. I don…
omnibrain | March 20, 2007It was one year ago today that I made the first post to Omni Brain. I never imagined we would do this well.
In the last year Omni Brain has undergone many many changes, the biggest of which have been Sandra of Neurofuture fame joining the blog, and moving to ScienceBlogs.
We started with not-even 3000 page views in our first full month and now receive tens of thousands of page views and visitors - which is pretty great for a smart ass little science blog! Our Technorati ranking has also grown by leaps and bounds; near 14,000 today.
Thanks everyone, for reading and for all your lively…
pharyngula | March 20, 2007
Clearly, the Hemelshots have a much more sophisticated relationship than we have. We're flying the pirate flag outside of our house, but every time we try to move on to the full pirate phase, we run aground on the fact that she thinks she should be the Cap'n, and then there are the swordfights on the stairs and walking the plank and black spots and mutinous crew, and then Skatje stabs us both in the back and declares herself captain. The pirate lifestyle is not a mellow, casual one that encourages cooperation.
oracknows | March 17, 2007Reflexology, as you may know, is the pseudoscientific "alternative medicine" modality whose central dogma is that each body part or organ maps to a certain place on the feet or hands and that by pressing on those locations on the feet (for example), the reflexologist can have a therapeutic effect. The question, however, is: Why the feet? I mean, why not other parts of the body? For example, there's a part of the body that's larger than the feet, and mapping different parts of the body to it makes just as much sense as mapping them to the feet. I'm referring to butt reflexology (warning:…