television
laelaps | March 13, 2009I am no fan of the "March of Progress", but I know it isn't going anywhere. It is too readily recognizable as an evolutionary image for its use to be discontinued. That is why I wasn't surprised to see it in a new commercial for Extra spearmint gum. What I was surprised by, however, was that the creators of the commercial think that sloths figured in our evolution somewhere between tarsiers and chimpanzees;
[facepalm]
Creationists don't like the commercial either, but for entirely different reasons. This chap, for instance, is so fervent in his belief in creationism that he feels deeply…
oracknows | March 5, 2009Damn, wouldn't it have been cool to have been the guy who found this? A Dalek, lost from Doctor Who since the 1970s or 1980s:
Workers were baffled how the Dr Who relic ended up there, but it may have been in the murky water for more than 30 years after being dumped during location filming in the '70s.
Marc Oakland, 42, who made the discovery, said: "I'd just shifted a tree branch with my foot when I noticed something dark and round slowly coming up to the surface. I got the shock of my life when a Dalek head bobbed up in front of me.
"It was covered in mould and weed, and had quite a bit of…
oracknows | February 28, 2009Why? Because I feel like it. For example, there are times I've felt like this:
Except that maybe I should sing a version called "I'm Afraid of Antivaccinationists." Nahhh. Instead let's go back. Way back:
sciencepunk | February 22, 2009A: No.
Although many news outlets (including the BBC) are claiming that a billion people will tune in to the 81st Academy Awards, the figure turns out to have little grounding in reality. The billion-strong audience claim has been knocking around for a long time - Daniel Radosh recounts in an article for the New Yorker that the figure was first touted way back in 1985. Although no supporting evidence has ever been provided to verify the claim, Radosh makes the reasoned guess that someone must extrapolated the 43.5 million domestic audience (15% of the US population) to 15% of the global…
oracknows | February 22, 2009From Canada, via Phil Plait, because in my current state I need a good laugh right about now. I'm also working on a rather large post for tomorrow about Andrew Wakefield and the Autism Omnibus, after which I hope to move on to other topics for a while. Nothing like getting back into the swing of things!
oracknows | February 14, 2009Unfortunately, as we have been dreading for the last four months or so since her relapse was diagnosed, my mother-in-law passed away from breast cancer in hospice. She died peacefully, with my wife and the rest of her family at her side. As you might expect, I do not much feel like blogging. Because I foresaw this day coming, however, I did set up a series of reposts to autopost for you while I am in mourning. Some, I have even updated and spiffed up. If you've been reading less than a year or two, they're new to you. If not, I hope you enjoy them again. I don't know when I'll be back, other…
oracknows | February 12, 2009Last night, I lambasted Countdown host Keith Olbermann for having been played by the antivaccine movement and having unjustly slimed British journalist Brian Deer. Clearly, Olbermann was so blinded by his hatred of Rupert Murdoch that all chief apologist for the antivaccine movement, former freelance journalist David Kirby, had to do was mention that The Times of London, the newspaper that published Brian Deer's excellent investigative report nailing anti-MMR guru Andrew Wakefield to the wall for falsifying data, is owned by Rupert Murdoch, and it was like waving the proverbial red cape in…
oracknows | February 11, 2009Stick a fork in Keith Olbermann. He's done.
He has now officially degenerated into a liberal version of Rush Limbaugh, except that Rush Limbaugh is occasionally funny. Maybe he's more like Sean Hannity, particularly in his apparent dedication to the truth, or, rather, lack thereof. Hannity detests liberals and will immediately attack on the slightest pretense, even if the information given to him of "liberal wrongdoing" is dubious or outright wrong. Like Hannity, Olbermann will never turn down an opportunity to attack Bill O'Reilly or his paymaster Rupert Murdoch. Somtimes it's justified, but…
oracknows | February 10, 2009I'm not as big a fan of Keith Olbermann as I used to be. Indeed, sometimes he strikes me as the liberal version of Rush Limbaugh, not to mention a blowhard. However, occasionally, he still has it, and when he's on, no one skewers the dishonest better than he does. For instance, after a media flack and the usual inclusion of Bill O'Reilly as runners up, meet Andrew Wakefield, the Worst Person in the World for February 10, 2009:
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Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy
That about sums it up right now.
I wonder how long before the antivaccinationist loons…
grrlscientist | February 4, 2009tags: David Attenborough, nature, evolution, environment, streaming video
British broadcaster Sir David Attenborough presents his views on Charles Darwin, natural selection, and how the Bible has put the natural world in peril in an exclusive interview for Nature Video [4:27]
grrlscientist | February 1, 2009tags: David Attenborough, nature, evolution, environment, streaming video
David Attenborough is a reality-based person. For example, he sees evolution as the cornerstone of all the programs he has ever made. In this upcoming one-hour special that airs tonight at 9pm on BBCOne in the UK, David shares his personal view on Darwin's controversial idea. If you are one of the lucky ones to see this program (it airs in a few minutes, so turn on that TV!), please share your thoughts about it here, as I am sure us Americans would love to know a little more about what we've missed. [2:01]
grrlscientist | February 1, 2009tags: unusual pets, humor, Superbowl 2009 commercial, pedigree dog food, streaming video
Ever think about getting an unusual pet like a bison, a boar, an ostrich or a rhino? See what happens to the pet owners in our Super Bowl ad, and then you'll know why you should get a dog. [0:30]
oracknows | January 16, 2009I hate to see this. I really do.
I really hate it to see people who think they're doing a good thing, who think they're raising money for a worthy charity, totally clueless that what they are doing is supporting the rankest pseudoscience and quackery. Here's an example from my hometown of Detroit. It's a story about a woman who's going to raise money for what she thinks is autism awareness and research at the North American International Auto Show in Detroit this coming week:
When it comes to dressing for the North American International Auto Show Charity Preview, attendee Val McFarland is…
oracknows | January 13, 2009Last 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…
oracknows | January 13, 2009About four weeks ago, I wrote what I thought to be an amusing piece about how our blog "buddy" J. B. Handley, antivaccine advocate extraordinaire and now second fiddle in the organization he founded (Generation Rescue) to a Jenny-come-lately former purveyor of Indigo Child woo previously best known for being Playboy Playmate of the Year, a game show hostess on MTV, the star of her own short-lived sitcom, and a gross-out comedienne known for eating her own vomit or sitting in a pool of her own menstrual blood. Unfortunately, along with her A-list boyfriend Jim Carrey, this former D-list star…
oracknows | January 10, 2009I don't watch Private Practice. I didn't like Grey's Anatomy, which, every time I caught part of it, struck me as the cheesiest sort of medical soap opera, a General Hospital transplanted to prime time. Given that Private Practice is a spinoff of Grey's Anatomy, I never saw any reason whatsoever to watch. However, on Thursday night an episode aired that royally pissed off the antivaccine contingent, and that has to be a good thing. The episode, Contamination, featured a storyline in which an unvaccinated child shows up in the emergency room with the measles. The parents are antivaccine and…
pontiff | January 5, 2009Anyone else catch Little Miss Sunshine on USA this weekend? The scene where the brother Dwayne breaks his vow of silence has to be one of the longest silence bleeps of all time. Anyone know of of a longer one (for one word, not for a string of words)?
oracknows | January 5, 2009Over the last year and a half, Jenny McCarthy has been, unfortunately, a fairly frequent topic of this blog. There is, of course, a reason for this. Ever since she published her first book on autism back in the summer of 2007, she has become the public face of the antivaccine movement and autism quackery. Indeed, Generation Rescue, that reliable bastion of antiscientific antivaccine pseudoscience and autism quackery, has been--shall we say?--rebranded as "Jenny McCarthy's Autism Organization." In the process, she has demonstrated a level of burning stupid that defies description, a stupidity…
oracknows | January 4, 2009Having recently learned that David Tennant plans to give up the TARDIS at the end of the next abbreviated series of Doctor Who (we Yanks tend to be a bit late on the uptake for news like that from across the pond), I just found out who the 11th Doctor will be after Tennant leaves: Matt Smith.
Forgive me, my UK readers, but before I found the BBC press release, I'd never heard of this guy before. (Of course, I had never really heard of David Tennant before he was chosen and only later realized that he had played Barty Crouch, Jr. in Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, and he turned out OK…
laelaps | December 29, 2008I would not have expected the Italian actress, model, author, and filmmaker Isabella Rossellini to have ever used the phrase "I will dig my palpae in her epigyne!", but in her series of short films, Green Porno, she does that and more.
Developed for the Sundance Channel, Rossellini has created a series of films that makes Dr. Tatiana's Sex Advice to All Creation seem absolutely innocuous. Rossellini dresses up as a series of insects (often the male) and graphically reenacts the mating habits of the animals;
Here's the one she made about snails (DEFINITELY NSFW!);
You can find the rest of…