Politics
pharyngula | October 17, 2011A group of scientists have done the right thing: they authored an environmental report, and are now publicizing the changes the Texas state administration tried to impose on it. This is going to backfire on the politicians: rather than hiding away the science that conflicts with their ideology, the censorship is highlighting the corruption and denialism.
Officials in Rick Perry's home state of Texas have set off a scientists' revolt after purging mentions of climate change and sea-level rise from what was supposed to be a landmark environmental report. The scientists said they were disowning…
esiegel | October 10, 2011"It suddenly struck me that that tiny pea, pretty and blue, was the Earth. I put up my thumb and shut one eye, and my thumb blotted out the planet Earth. I didn't feel like a giant. I felt very, very small." -Neil Armstrong
It still boggles my mind when I think about it, every time I look up at the brightest object in our night sky.
Image credit: Michael H. Myers.
After four-and-a-half billion years, life from Earth made it off of this planet, launching ourselves out of the Earth's atmosphere and away from the bounds of Earth's gravity.
Image credit: NASA.
After a more-than-200,000 mile…
esiegel | October 2, 2011"None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free." -Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
"Change does not roll in on the wheels of inevitability, but comes through continuous struggle. And so we must straighten our backs and work for our freedom. A man can't ride you unless your back is bent." -Martin Luther King, Jr.
Whether you're someone who pays attention to the news or not, you are surely aware of the titanic struggles for freedom going on all over the world, from the United States to Libya, from Cairo to Kabul, from Saudi Arabia to Thailand. This weekend I've got a…
oracknows | September 30, 2011I've gotten into quite a few arguments over whether there is more anti-science nonsense on the right or the left lately. Actually, none of these arguments have been on the blog, mainly because I tend not to relish getting into discussions that are far more weighted towards politics than actual science or medicine. Still, sometimes I see something that leads me to think about venturing into the minefield of science and politics. This has been particularly true ever since the campaign for the Republican nomination has shifted into high gear and Michelle Bachmann's recent descent even further…
sa smith | September 29, 2011AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHH!!!!
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHH!!!!
*runningaroundlikeacrazyperson*
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHH!!!!!!
*pointsexcitedlytolink*
An evening with AYAAN HIRSI ALI
October 27, 2011
7.30 pm
Te Ata Memorial Auditorium
Chickasha, OK
(pdf)
I AM FREAKING OUT!!!!!!!
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH!!!
catdynamics | September 29, 2011Ok, peeps, the NASA Explorer AO outcomes are out, and you know what they are: so, who lost, and more importantly, who won?
PS: and the winners are...
NASA Selects Science Investigations For Concept Studies
Five Explorer Mission proposals were selected from 22 submitted in February. Each team will receive $1 million to conduct an 11-month mission concept study. Mission costs are capped at $200 million each, excluding the launch vehicle.
In addition, one Explorer Mission proposal was selected for technology development and will receive $600,000.
Five Mission of Opportunity proposals were…
catdynamics | September 28, 2011On saturday Alþingi, the Icelandic Parliament, reconvenes.
Protests are planned on the square outside, and there are suggestions that a new wave of protests may build up, similar to the "Household Revolution" back in the winter of 2008.
But there will be some missing from the demos.
On Wednesday, at informal meetings, a number of Icelandic Police, both from departments in the south west, where Reykjavík is, and in the north, declared that they would not be serving on the Riot Police squad.
As I understand, call up to riot squad duty, is essentially, non-mandatory overtime shift work, beyond…
jtoney | September 26, 2011Israel Prime Minister Netanyahu and Palestine's President Abbas gave back to back speeches last Friday at the United Nations General Assembly, a highly controversial event with Palestine's bid for formal recognition. As a scientist, such matters are far too complex for me, as they are embedded with layers of subtlety and inscrutable politics. I am much more comfortable in a world driven by logic and data.
My young children have been learning about the Israel-Palestinian conflict in various contexts and have shared these discussions with me. How can our next generation understand or process…
pharyngula | September 20, 2011The state of Georgia is planning to execute a man for murder tomorrow, on the basis of a very shaky case in which most of the witnesses have recanted their testimony, and who have said the police pressured them into their initial accusations. I can't make any judgments on whether he is guilty or innocent — the case has not been made strongly enough to justify an irrevocable and terminal decision. That is why it is criminally wrong for the state to kill him for this crime.
The Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles is about to commit an injustice. Write or fax them at (404) 651-8502 now.
You can…
sa smith | September 19, 2011What do you get when you combine "GO AWAY. NO ONE LIKES YOU. Part I" with "GO AWAY. NO ONE LIKES YOU. Part II"?
Dear Sally Kern and Discovery Institute--
GO AWAY. NO ONE LIKES YOU.
Yours in Christ--
--ERV
The DI is going to be showing their perverted Creationism pornographic film tonight at the Sam Nobel Natural History Museum. Meanwhile, in what Im sure is a crazy random happenstance, Sally Kern *was* going to introduce a pro-Creationism bill today in the OK legislature. But now shes doing it next week (too busy with the DI 'fellows' giving each other political hand jobs today, Im assuming…
catdynamics | September 15, 2011curious rumour about JWST and the Senate: supposedly major testing of JWST integration is being moved to Johnson Space Center and Marshall is also pickingup some significant system integration action
don't know enough history to know if this is an actual change in plans, nor can I confirm it at this stage
interesting bit of politicking if true, now we have to see if it does the trick
PS: haven't seen full Senate appropriations bill - think they only released the summary, but, $500M is cut from NASA and the Senate Launch System is funded - so what was cut?
Also NSF and NIST are cut to get…
catdynamics | September 15, 2011Ethan reports Senate Appropriations committee reinserted JWST funding in its bill, at some cost.
Issue will now move to conference committee, where we'll find out how serious the House republicans are about making an example of JWST
catdynamics | September 15, 2011We're back, we're tanned, we're rested, we're ready: 4th day, session 7,
in which Kepler annouces the discovery of the second circumbinary exoplanet...
Ok, we're not going yet, but the press release came out at noon:
Kepler-16b
- 41d orbital period binary star, KV primary (bit less massive than the Sun).
Secondary is an M star.
Sub-solar metallicity, low eccentricity stellar orbit (e1=0.15)
about 60 pc away.
Planet is transiting, natch, 0.33 MJM
in a 229d near circular circumbinary orbit.
This is the second circumbinary planet discovered, after 1620-26b and the first orbiting two main…
pharyngula | September 14, 2011There was another Republican debate (I skipped it; there are limits to the horrors I can endure), and apparently, many people think Michele Bachmann trumped Rick Perry by jumping on his 'liberal' endorsement of using the HPV vaccine to prevent cancers in women. Bachmann ranted about the federal government forcing innocent little girls to get mental retardation injections, and the teabaggers loved it. They loved it almost as much as they loved Rick Perry's record of executions.
Orac rips her apart. It's great fun, and informative, too.
As I've pointed out time and time again, Gardasil is…
oracknows | September 13, 2011I don't often blog about politics anymore. As I've said on more than one occasion, political bloggers are a dime a dozen. Rare is the one that interests me much. However, sometimes things happen that lead me to make an exception, except that this time it's not really an exception because it has to do with two of the main topics that this blog is all about: science and the anti-vaccine movement. Those of you who watched the Republican debate the other day or saw the news reports about it yesterday probably know where this is going, but I'll go there anyway. First, I can't help but express my…
catdynamics | September 13, 2011 Earlier, Matthew Bailes and collaborators discovered a planet mass, carbon rich crystalline object orbiting a pulsar.
It was a very nice discovery, published in Science, and received a lot of attention, mostly all positive.
Matthew has now written a very interesting OpEd at The Conversation:
Diamond planets, climate change and the scientific method
It is a very perceptive piece and make some very important points.
Please read it and join The Conversation.
"The scientific method is universal. If we selectively ignore it in certain disciplines, we do so at our peril."
cevans | September 13, 2011A couple of months ago, I wrote a piece here on Universe exploring the ideas of the futurist Gerard K. O'Neill, who designed far-out but ultimately quite pragmatic environments for human habitation in space in the mid-1970s. In that article, I touched briefly on the notion of the "Overview Effect," a phrase coined by the writer Frank White to describe the profound insight -- characterized by a sudden awareness of life's interconnectedness and the frailty of our planet -- experienced by astronauts gazing down at the Earth from space.
Frank White is the author of The Overview Effect: Space…
sa smith | September 13, 2011An infinite loop of crazy--
Apparently Michele Bachmann (Crazy, MN) wants her daughters (and any/all women) to get cervical cancer if they grow up to engage in any kind of sex their mother doesnt agree with (but almost certainly engaged in herself), so at the Republican debate for whatever, she 'called out' Rick Perry (Crazy, TX) for legislating mandatory HPV vaccines for girls.
To have innocent little 12-year-old girls be forced to have a government injection through an executive order is just flat out wrong. That should never be done. That's a violation of a liberty interest.
"Well, I'm…
catdynamics | September 12, 2011JWST has called for a townhall meeting (webinar) on Mon 19th Sep
http://www.stsci.edu/jwst/meetings/webinar2011 (registration required)
to discuss the technical and funding situation.
Should be interesting
Bring popcorn.