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gregladen | December 28, 2012And by "Prestigious" I mean .... well, see for yourself in this story from Media Matters for America (Reposted with permission):
Climate Change Misinformer Of The Year: Marc Morano
ClimateDepot.com founder Marc Morano has been called "the Matt Drudge of climate denial," the "king of the skeptics," and "a central cell of the climate-denial machine," and he revels in these descriptions. Although he has no scientific expertise, he is adamant that manmade global warming is a "con job" based on "subprime science." Morano gained prominence working for two of the most vocal climate deniers in the U.…
gregladen | December 28, 2012... Twice. The story is here. Basically, the sign was first spay painted, the burned. Run of the mill anti-atheist vandalism. But, if you are not already tapped out from the Happy Holiday Season of Buying Stuff, you might want to go to this web page and make a small donation to WASH, who originally paid for the sign. It would be funny if they made a couple thousand bucks as a result of a hate crime.
carlyo | December 27, 2012The most memorable remaining landmark from Montreal’s fabulous Expo 67 is the giant geodesic dome designed by architect, engineer and futurist Buckminster Fuller (1895-1983) for the U.S. pavilion. The magnificent 62 meter high dome now houses an environmental museum known as the “Biosphere.” Fuller, who dreamed of energy efficient homes, recycling and global sustainability long before these ideas became fashionable, would be pleased. But the famous inventor, writer and designer surely never dreamed that his name would be immortalized in numerous chemistry journals, lectures and textbooks. “…
carlyo | December 26, 2012--Co-creator and co-founder of YouTube with partners Chad Hurley and Steven Chen
--One of the first computer engineers behind the success of PayPal, the online payment service
--Recently started his own internet service, Youniversity Ventures
Even as a teen, Jawed Karim displayed considerable talent and genius in the realm of computer science. Among his early feats: As a high school senior, while creating a website for a research lab at the University of Minnesota, he came up with a complex computational process to help the lab map the atomic structure of a crucial protein -- a process that…
gregladen | December 26, 2012"Dr. who?" you might ask. And that would be funny.
I am not an expert on the old Dr Who's by any means, but it has come to my attention that a lot of people are unaware of the recent addition of Dr. Who shows on Netflix, even though I did post something about this on my facebook page. Try to keep up, people.
Here is the specially designed Netflix page which provides many of the important details.
And here is a cool blog post I found that covers the larger issue of access to all/many of the Dr. Who episodes.
So there you go.
gregladen | December 24, 2012As you know, as part of a fund raiser for the Secular Student Alliance, I wrote a novella called Sungodogo, which I've since made available on Amazon for the Kindle (and in other formats ... I'll have a print version in January some time). The book is about a handful of people who travel across the Congo in search of an elusive primate. What they find instead is quite unexpected. Yes, there are elusive primates but not at all what was expected. The story then becomes the origin story for the modern Skeptics and Secular Movements, and explains the rise of anti-feminist haters like those of…
gregladen | December 23, 2012I've been lucky. Becoming a secularist and atheist and, to some extent, activist in those areas (though I quickly add my activisms is mostly in other areas) was not to hard. Hey, this very morning Minnesota Atheists had a show on what you do for Christmas and other holidays as a non-believer, and asked for contributions. Even though I was asked directly a few times by the producers, I ended up providing nothing because I've got nothing; What do we do for Christmas? Try to eat the cookies very slowly, unwrap the presents very quickly. It is just not that interesting.
Sure, I get harassed…
jrosenhouse | December 21, 2012Go have a look at this post over at HuffPo. It's called “Science and Faith: Reconciling After the Divorce,” by Dave Pruett. To judge from that title, you might surmise that's it's not exactly my cup of tea, and you'd be right. The catch, though, is that Dave is a very good friend of mine, having just retired after many years in the math department right here at JMU.
Dave has a new book out called Reason and Wonder: A Copernican Revolution in Science and Spirit, from which the present essay has been drawn. I'm about fifty pages in so far and I am finding it a fascinating read, even…
gregladen | December 21, 2012The just uploaded podcast of Skeptically Speaking is a must-hear:
Whether you’re dropping a last-minute hint to a relative, or buying science books for the people you love, Skeptically Speaking has you covered. We’ve enlisted two dozen scientists, science writers and bloggers, including some of our favorite past guests. They’ll bring you their favorites from 2012, and some classics to help fill out anyone’s science library. Happy holidays!
(Mine is at about 19 minutes.)
Role Models in Science & Engineering Achievement: Yoky Matsuoka -- Leading Researcher in Neurobotics
carlyo | December 21, 2012--One of the nation's preeminent scientists in neurobotics -- an emerging field that merges neuroscience with robotics
--Her work could one day allow artificial limbs to be controlled directly through patients' brain signals
Growing up in Japan, Yoky Matsuoka, driven and highly competitive, was on her way to becoming a world-class tennis player, even having made the qualifying rounds for Wimbleton. However, when injuries ended her tennis dreams, she turned to another early interest: robotics. Twenty years later Matsuoka is now a leader in the emerging field of neurobotics, hard at work…
gregladen | December 21, 2012The web site pertaining to the following video is HERE. Click through to participate.
Ooops, I may have put on the wrong video. Sorry about that NRA.
gregladen | December 20, 2012Scene: Berkeley, California, April 1986. A bar. Five conference attendees, myself included, grabbing a hamburger and a beer in a fern-bar on or near Telegraph.
All eyes are on the TVs mounted over the bar, where we watch footage of an air strike against Libya. This is the retribution by Ronald Reagan against Insane African Leader Muammar al-Gaddafi. The White House was issuing statements about al-Gaddafi's involvement in bombings in Europe, the OPEC oil ministry kidnapping, linkage to the infamous Jackal, and so on. Nikki, a friend and colleague, said something, and I remember asking…
jrosenhouse | December 20, 2012This is encouraging:
The Orleans Parish School Board, which controls the curriculum and policies for six schools in New Orleans, voted Tuesday to ban the teaching of creationism as science and a “revisionist” history course touted in Texas.
Although none of these six New Orleans schools currently teaches creationism or “intelligent design,” outgoing Orleans Parish School Board President Thomas Robichaux is making sure they never will, The Times-Picayune first reported in November.
The newly approved policy bans teachers from including “any aspect of religious faith” in science courses and…
gregladen | December 20, 2012American Atheists and two co-plaintiffs today filed in U.S. District Court in the Eastern District of Kentucky a lawsuit demanding that the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) stop giving preferential treatment to churches and religious organizations via the process of receiving non-profit tax-exempt status under the Internal Revue Code (IRC) procedures and definitions.
“American Atheists receives tax-exempt status under Internal Revenue Code 501(c)(3),” said American Atheists President David Silverman, “but because the organization is not classified as religious it costs American Atheists, along…
gregladen | December 20, 20121) The number of people who care more about gun control than about the 2nd amendment has been greater for some time now, and it has shifted even further. This is according to a new poll by Pew Research Center: After Newtown, Modest Change in Opinion about Gun Control
Most Say Assault Weapons Make Nation More Dangerous
2) NASA has a new design for their next generation space suit, and it looks familiar. Have a look. NASA's is the one on the left:
3) Facebook is going to start charging one dollar per message for certain messages. They say it is for your own good.
In a statement posted…
jrosenhouse | December 19, 2012I don't have anything in particular to say in response to the massacre in Newtown, CT. The usual folks are making the usual arguments, of course. Many are suggesting that teachers and principals should be packing heat. Unless you're going to make combat training part of teacher certification, that sounds like a bad idea. Having more guns in schools does not sound like a recipe for increased safety. From the other side, it just seems obvious to me that certain forms of weaponry, automatic weapons and enormous ammunition clips for example, are so inherently dangerous and serve no function…
carlyo | December 19, 2012--Famous for naming and advancing the scientific concept of “Fuzzy Logic” as well as “Fuzzy Sets” and “Fuzzy Systems”
--These concrete principles have been applied to numerous fields – from computer technology to artificial intelligence
You've likely heard of the term “Fuzzy Logic” or “Fuzzy Mathematics”. But despite what their names may imply, there is nothing inexact about these scientific concepts. Based on precise formulas, Fuzzy Logic, introduced in 1965 by Lotfi Asker Zadeh (a mathematician of Iranian-Russian descent), helps scientists, mathematicians and others to make accurate…