Weirdness
pharyngula | May 4, 2006Various science-deniers at the ID websites were unhappy with me because I said belief in ID was an indicator of incompetence, and that I wouldn't vote to to support tenure and promotion for one of their guys. I think they ought to adopt Florentino Floro as a cause.
"They should not have dismissed me for what I believed," Florentino Floro, a trial judge in the capital's Malabon northern suburb, told reporters after filing his appeal.
Floro was sacked last month and fined 40,000 pesos ($780) after a three-year investigation found he was incompetent, had shown bias in a case he was trying and…
pharyngula | April 29, 2006Grrlscientist is pushing another of those online quiz thingies—What's Your Theme Song?—and it was quick and easy, so I took it. Now I'm horribly scarred. Especially compared to my fellow science bloggers, I got a result that disturbs me deeply. I may end up getting kicked off scienceblogs over this.
Your Theme Song is Oops I Did It Again by Britney Spears
"It might seem like a crush
But it doesn't mean that I'm serious"
Heartbreaker, superflirt, player... you've been called all of those.
You're not that innocent, and you know that you have a super sexy vibe!
What's Your Theme Song…
pharyngula | April 27, 2006One moment I'm posting about jawless fish, the next I'm sent a link to the bravest, craziest young people to infest a marine station.
Yes, the two stories are connected.
pharyngula | April 25, 2006
Chuck Olson has captured Geek Prom 2006 on video. Be prepared to be shocked: there's the talent show, the spaz dancing, the coronation, parades of geeks in strange costumes, and most terrifying of all…nerd nudity. Not safe for work or individuals with any sense of taste or propriety.
pharyngula | April 22, 2006
Is there anything geekier than blogging from the prom? Come on out to St Paul for the party—Mary and I are the pair in lab coats, and yes, that is just a squid in my pocket.
pharyngula | April 20, 2006
Oh, sure. They say it's just a way to play videogames with your pet hamster or mouse, but I think it's an exercise in training rodents in how to hunt down and kill us. The only thing saving us now is that they don't know what to do with a health-pac or ammo or a BFG9000 when they find it on the floor.
pharyngula | April 20, 2006The true history of the world is told in the movies, so obviously what we need is a compilation of movie events to see what was really going on. It's a work in progress, so there are a few gaps—the period between 1 zillion BC and 65,000,000 BC is a bit sparse on information—but more recent events are better covered. For instance, the year of my birth was quite busy:
1957New Zealand - Lionel Pritchard and his girlfriend Paquita battle a horde of zombies (Braindead)
Camp Crystal Lake, New Jersey - Jason Voorhees drowns (Friday the 13th)
Michael Myers born (Hallowe'en)
Lana Turner meets Johnny…
pharyngula | April 19, 2006We biologists think we're all grody and cool with our dead mice, but then some smart-aleck chemist has to go trump us all with thermite explosions. That just isn't fair.
Just wait. Now some physicist is going to come along and make us all envious with his homebuilt laser.
Hold it! I just had a brilliant thought! If we got a physicist, a chemist, and a biologist together, we could make a laser-triggered thermite mouse trap. That would be waaaaaay better than a glue trap.
pharyngula | April 17, 2006Modern digital technology allows us to see the unimaginable. George Bush sings Imagine.
(via Badgerings)
pharyngula | April 15, 2006Pope Ratzi was in charge of a parade yesterday, where everyone pretends to know every footfall of poorly documented Jewish rabbi's execution, so they can re-enact it and make portentous comments at every step. The whole thing is online, if you want to read it. The Seventh Station is the interesting one.
But what is it that today, in particular,
strikes at Christ's holy body?
Surely God is deeply pained
by the attack on the family.
Today we seem to be witnessing
a kind of anti-Genesis,
a counter-plan, a diabolical pride
aimed at eliminating the family.
There is a move to reinvent mankind,…
pharyngula | April 14, 2006If I had one, that is. A reader cruelly sent me a ghastly link to the Christian song stylings of Lil' Markie.
Cthulhu, take me now. My psyche is scarred.
pharyngula | April 14, 2006You tell me…should I be flattered at all the email coming in from people saying that the phrase "flailing around like a lubed-up squid" brought me immediately to their mind?
Maybe it was the erotic resonance of the image that elicits that prompts the association…
Please don't tell me I'm the only one who detects the erotic resonance.
pharyngula | April 13, 2006What a waste of good cephalopod images, using them to make a mosaic of yours truly. It's made using some softward called MacOSaiX, if you're interested in trying some yourself.
pharyngula | April 11, 2006
Alas, I fear that if I let myself be bitten by a squid, all I'd get for my trouble is a very nasty infection, and possibly a few toxins.
pharyngula | April 10, 2006
Who would have thought these words would ever be typed by me? I'm looking forward to Ann Coulter's new book.
It's called Godless(amzn/b&n/abe/pwll). Apparently, Ann Coulter has written a book about me, although I suspect that she'll instead be pretending that people like me are representative of the Democratic Party as a whole. I wish.
I'm sure it will be insightful, nuanced, and meticulously researched. Maybe Al Franken and I should get together in a summer book club to discuss it.
We should invade their countries, kill their leaders and convert them to Christianity.
Ann Coulter
P.S.…
pharyngula | April 5, 2006I mentioned that I was getting a curious number of hits for the term "anencephaly" the other day, and was wondering what was prompting it. Readers have been sending me strange and obscure bits of news that might be relevant, such as this account of an unusual birth in Nepal.
The neck-less baby with its head almost totally sunk into the upper part of the body and with extraordinarily large eyeballs literally popping out of the eye-sockets, was born to Nir Bahadur Karki and Suntali Karki at the Gaurishnkar Hospital in Charikot.
The article has pictures (if the description above makes you…
pharyngula | April 4, 2006I have a dream. I want to see the Genetic Omni-Dominance guy and John Titor, Time Traveler get together and have a conversation. I think it would be cosmic.
This is controversial stuff, too…should I be teaching it in my classes?
(via FrinkTank and Overcompensating)