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tqa | November 7, 2006When someone you love is deployed, you do your best to put your fears out of your mind. You take things as they come, you do what needs to be done, and you very quickly get good at not thinking too much about other things. Most of the time you can keep most of your mind away from things like IEDs, and ambushes, and sectarian violence. With daily phone contact and email, it can be easy to think of the deployment as nothing more than a long, long business trip. You can keep that up for day after day, as the long deployment slowly - glacially - moves along. You can keep that up for day after day…
stcynic | November 6, 2006I am in the middle of moving today, getting ready to dismantle my computer and move it to the new house. Phones and internet are scheduled to be hooked up sometime tomorrow, so I should be back online by evening tomorrow. In the meantime, I've got a few posts scheduled to go up tomorrow morning for your entertainment. Try not to trash the place while I'm gone.
grrlscientist | November 6, 2006I just started reading Richard Dawkins' new book, The God Delusion, and already discovered an interesting new word.
Bowdlerize (bohd-luh-rahyz, boud-) [Origin: 1830-40; after Thomas Bowdler (1754-1825), the English editor who published an expurgated edition of Shakespeare in 1818.]
tr.v.
To expurgate (a book, for example) prudishly.
To modify, as by shortening or simplifying or by skewing the content in a certain manner.
to expurgate (a written work) by removing or modifying passages considered vulgar or objectionable.
Usage: The very word 'religions' is bowdlerized to '…
stcynic | November 6, 2006Frank Schaeffer, son of prominent Christian conservative philosopher Francis Schaeffer, has written an op-ed piece announcing that he will no longer support the Republican Party because of the Allen campaign's appalling treatment of James Webb in their Senate race.
I never served in the military. It was my son's unexpected volunteering that connects me to the military family and to my country. And I've been voting Republican for years. My late father - Dr. Francis Schaeffer - was an evangelical theologian, friend to Jerry Falwell and White House guest of Ronald Reagan, Gerald Ford and the…
stcynic | November 6, 2006Saddam Hussein has, of course, been found guilty of genocide by an Iraqi court and will be hanged (assuming the automatic appeals process required under Iraqi law goes as it should). I frankly don't much care about complaints about the trial procedure, or conspiracy theories about the process being rigged; the man was afforded far more protections than the thousands of people he had slaughtered while he ruled Iraq as a brutal dictator. I can muster up no sympathy for the man, nor will I try.
But one of the comments I saw yesterday left me shaking my head. Someone said, "Ramsey Clark should…
stcynic | November 6, 2006John McAdams is a Marquette University professor who has commented here from time to time. We probably don't agree on a whole lot, but I've always found him to be a reasonable guy. But I came across this post on his blog and I must object. He's responding to an ad he saw for a clinic that provides egg donors and surrogates for gays who want to have children. He writes:
We understand the desire of people, gay or straight, to have children, and even to have children who are their biological offspring.
But should children really be thought of as just another consumer purchase?
But I don't see…
pharyngula | November 6, 2006
So there's this election tomorrow, and the Republicans have consistently screwed the pooch for years, and people are starting to wake up and get more vocal about the incompetence, corruption, and dumbassery of this administration…but I am not sanguine about our prospects for getting rid of the villains. Tom Tomorrow explains why: even if these people were shown to be literally demons from hell, we'd still have to cope with…the undecided voters.
I lost all confidence in the American electorate in 2000 and 2004. I'll be doing my part on Tuesday, voting and helping to turn out the vote, but I…
purepedantry | November 5, 2006DNA Artistry will make a special piece of art from your DNA:
DNA-Artistry: The Art of Science -- creating one-of-a-kind genetic portraits.
DNA-Artistry gives new meaning to the term "original art." It's a self-portrait that's as individual - and unique - as you are. DNA-Artistry uses the science of your individual DNA sequence to create art in the form of your very own genetic blueprint. One that is beautifully - and colorfully - expressed on canvas or in print.
It all starts with a profile: yours.
DNA-Artistry uses DNA profiling, a tool to identify an individual's unique genetic makeup. A…
stcynic | November 5, 2006Israel is refusing to cancel this week's gay pride parade in the face of escalating violence from the anti-gay loonies.
Attorney General Menachem Mazuz refused on Sunday to ban a gay pride march planned for Friday in Jerusalem despite threats of violence from an extremist sect.
Police advocated canceling the parade and warned Mazuz that they had "viable" information that members of the Haredi ultra Orthodox Jewish sect would attempt to kill marchers and gay community leaders if the parade were not stopped.
"Giving in to threats is in itself a threat to democracy, and therefore not holding…
purepedantry | November 5, 2006Shelley Batts, fellow ScienceBlogger and proprietor of Retrospectacle, is applying for a blogging scholarship -- which I didn't even know existed until now. Unfortunately it is kind of a popularity contest using web voting to determine the outcome. Right now the PoliSci people (gasp) are winning, so if you have a free moment would you go vote for her and show some neuroscience pride.
Simply go to this site, and click on "Shelley Batts." She could use the money, and your participation would be appreciated.
UPDATE: The Blogging Scholarship has moved and is now here.
stcynic | November 5, 2006It seems that Haggard, without getting specific, is finally admitting to what was obvious to everyone else days ago:
In a letter that was read to the congregation of the New Life Church by another clergyman, Haggard apologized for his acts and requested forgiveness.
"I am so sorry for the circumstances that have caused shame and embarrassment for all of you," he said, adding that he had confused the situation by giving inconsistent remarks to reporters denying the scandal.
"The fact is I am guilty of sexual immorality. And I take responsibility for the entire problem. I am a deceiver and a…
grrlscientist | November 5, 2006I found this fine word in the interesting and well-written book Not in Our Classrooms, edited by Eugenie C. Scott and Glenn Branch.
Atavistic (at-UH-vis-tik) [French atavisme, from Latin atavus, ancestor: atta, father + avus, grandfather]
adj.
Of, pertaining to, or characterized by atavism; reverting to or suggesting the characteristics of a remote ancestor or primitive type.
The reappearance of a characteristic in an organism after several generations of absence, usually caused by the chance recombination of genes.
An individual or a part that exhibits atavism. Also; throwback.
The…
stcynic | November 5, 2006Balko reports that a gambling group is targeting Arizona Sen. John Kyl, one of the most vociferous advocates of gambling bans. Kyl's lead in the polls is shrinking fast. Let's keep this up, though.
grrlscientist | November 4, 2006I found this fine word in the interesting and well-written book Not in Our Classrooms, edited by Eugenie C. Scott and Glenn Branch. You might notice that this is first verb that I've used for word of the day so far.
Vitiate (vish-ee-eyt) [Latin vitiÄre; to spoil.]
v.
to impair the quality of; make faulty; spoil.
to impair or weaken the effectiveness of.
to debase; corrupt; pervert.
to make legally defective or invalid; invalidate: to vitiate a claim.
Usage: The sigificance for creationist claims about irreducible complexity is clear: the possibility of change of function in…
stcynic | November 4, 2006Radley Balko links to this article about a prosecutor who seized 3 cars from the parents of a guy caught trying to buy oxycontin. Not a dealer, not a distributor (they never even charged him with either), just a user; and they seized his parents' vehicles. They were kind enough to tell the parents that they could buy the cars back if they wanted to. This is crazy. And you know why no legislator will try and do anything about it? Because they don't want to face all those commercials you're seeing right now, those stupid, distorted campaign commercials. They don't want to face a commercial in…
stcynic | November 4, 2006The Pennsylvania Bar Association has given an award to Eric Rothschild and Steve Harvey of Pepper Hamilton for their pro bono work in the Dover ID case. The award is richly deserved. I have never seen a law firm put the kind of immense resources into a pro bono case as Pepper Hamilton did in that case. For a major firm, pro bono work is what you let the kids fresh out of law school do, the ones without a big client list, in order to get them some experience. Not in this case. They assigned 3 full partners and 2 associates to the case and gave them incredible resources to get the job done. And…
stcynic | November 4, 2006I saw him say this on TV and just sat there with my mouth agape:
I don't like the tone in Washington, D.C. I feel like that the politics has gotten ugly, and that tends to discourage people around the country. And that's just too bad.
This from the guy who had his underlings doing push-polling during the 2000 election to inform people that John McCain had a "biracial" baby. How about that tone, George, was that okay? Oh wait, that was the tone in South Carolina, not in Washington DC. Now tell us again how you don't like the tone, then tell us all about how the terrorists will win if people…
stcynic | November 3, 2006The plot thickens. The Rocky Mountain News reports:
Embattled minister Ted Haggard this morning admitted receiving a massage from the Denver man who claims to have exchanged sex for money with the Colorado Springs church leader for three years.
And a local news station reports:
Haggard says he bought the meth from a gay escort, 49-year-old Michael Jones, after contacting him for a massage.
Haggard says he never used the meth and instead threw it away.
However, Haggard could not remember where he threw the meth away.
According to Haggard, he met with Jones in a Denver hotel room.
Haggard…
stcynic | November 3, 2006Hardly a surprise, but still pretty funny. He claimed that his high school football coach started him at quarterback because of his leadership skills. His coach says, "I did?"
DeVos recounts a conversation he had with then-head varsity football coach Frank Rosengren: "He and I took a walk right behind this building (the old gym). It was a warm day and I remember he told me, 'Dick, I am going to start you because you have leadership skills and the team responds to your leadership.' "
DeVos went on to say: "That was a great encouragement to me. Those words were very important to me. Someone I…
grrlscientist | November 3, 2006I found this fine word this morning in the New York Times story about William Styron entitled Styron Visible: Naming the Evils that Humans Do, by Michiko Kitutani.
Oeuvre (Å-vruh) [French uvre from Old French uevre, work, from Latin opera, plural of opus, work]
n.
A work of art.
the works of a writer, painter, composer or the like, taken as a whole.
any one of the works of a writer, painter, composer or the like.
Usage: Although Mr. Styron's oeuvre seems somewhat slender in retrospect, each of his major novels built upon its predecessor's achievements, working variations on earlier…