March 5, 2010
The Disco. 'Tute is displeased. Or perhaps not. They love attention, especially in a venue like the New York Times. But they hate having attention drawn to their agenda or the details of what they advocate. Thus, we getâ¦
Shorter Disco.:
Yes we think AGW and evolution are bogus, but how dare…
March 4, 2010
James Hrynyshyn has a great response to John West's quote in today's New York Times article on creationism and global warming:
Any efforts to ensure science education is "balanced," in any subject, must be accompanied by reassurances that science classes will stick to science, and not embrace…
March 4, 2010
Looking through the raw data from Pew's surveys on science from last summer, I cannot make heads or tails of certain findings.
I started out looking at the correlation between rejection of evolution and rejection of global warming. As one would expect, it was significant. But the survey handily…
March 4, 2010
Shorter D'enyse D'ohLeary: Global warming transforms New York Times to toast:
My toes are smarter than I am.
No really! Actual D'ohLeary:
My toes think that the global warming people are wrong. Do I know? No.
Because she got frostbite. In Ottawa.
OMG! Global warming is a lie becauseâ¦Â Canada…
March 4, 2010
The latest addition to LA's food scene is apparently Top Chef winner Ilan Hall's Scottish/Jewish fusion restaurant The Gorbals. According to The Oklahoman (!), Hall is catching some flack:
Ilan Hall received his first piece of hate mail a couple of weeks ago. The writer expressed disgust with…
March 3, 2010
For the last year or so, I've been in touch with a reporter at the New York Times about a growing trend of creationists adding global warming to their enemies lists. Tomorrow, her story â Darwin Foes Add Warming to Targets â hits the front page of the paper of record:
Critics of the teaching of…
March 1, 2010
It's true that there's a lot of overlap between creationists and global warming deniers. Lots of creationists have been conditioned to reject claims of scientific consensus, and so throw in with the deniers.
However, the global warming deniers know that creationism is bad science, and that linking…
March 1, 2010
Tomorrow is the Texas primary elections, in which voters will have a chance to rid themselves of such scourges to public education as Don McLeroy and Ken Mercer. Cynthia Dunbar is, thankfully, leaving the Board, as is Rick Agosto. Bob Craig, a right-wing Republican, is being challenged by someone…
February 27, 2010
Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy
No hint whether Rachel Maddow picked up this story from the Huffington Post, Science Progress, Think Progress, Bad Astronomy, Pharyngula, or your friendly neighborhood TfK, but the mockery is sufficiently abundant.
February 26, 2010
I've got a column at Science Progress arguing just that (in my internal accounting, McLean was Scopes II, Kitzmiller was Scopes III):
Legislators in South Dakota seem bent on becoming anti-science pioneers. After a century of anti-evolution policies and legislation across the United States, the…
February 26, 2010
Commenter SLC tricked me into violating my moratorium on reading anti-accommodationist blogs, curse him. The discussion, such as it is, focuses on an essay written by Francis Collins introducing a book of essays on religious belief. Naturally, this has various people up in arms, clamoring for…
February 26, 2010
A year into the administration, after the teabagging parties and record numbers of filibusters, senior Obama advisor Axelrod finally used the magic words:
The American people ... all they want is an up or down vote.
"Up or down vote" is the framing used by Republicans to break the last filibuster…
February 25, 2010
Shorter Fox's Shep Smith on the President's healthcare summit:
Democrats are partisan hacks for inviting the GOP to participate in healthcare negotiations even though they know GOP has nothing to offer.
Oy.
February 25, 2010
This is his actual argument against allowing the Senate to pass healthcare reform by a simple majority:
the United States is not going to tolerate a group of people trying apply kind of a Hugo Chavez majoritarian rule
Is that why we hate Hugo Chavez now? Because of his profound commitment to…
February 25, 2010
There are few things that Richard Dawkins and Matt Nisbet agree about regarding science communication in the internets, but apparently there's a general consensus that you're a douchebag.
I haven't got strong feelings on the RichardDawkins.net forum shutdown. Dawkins is right that people were…
February 23, 2010
Against my better judgment, I've read some posts by anti-accommodationists. If I decide I enjoy banging my head against a wall, I may even respond to some of them. Otherwise, I'll have to distract myself.
For the moment, I'm also playing with Twitter, so if you want to see what I've twat, check…
February 21, 2010
Even though there's a huge digital divide in Brazil, as many people use the Internet to gain science knowledge as use museums. And no other source approaches either of those.
If I had to pick one lesson from this morning's session and the afternoon session, it would be that the internet has…
February 21, 2010
There's lots to delve into in Jon Miller's study of civic scientific literacy, not least that US student jump from poor science performance in high school to high science literacy as adults thanks largely to the mandatory year-long science course most colleges require.
More important, perhaps, is…
February 21, 2010
Jon Miller replies to my question about the difference in fundamentalist cultures in US vs. Europe that fundamentalism is so rare in Europe that it doesn't matter, and can't overwhelm long-standing traditions of hierarchal knowledge flows. Spain has a very conservative subculture within its…
February 21, 2010
Bora Zivkovic is telling the scientists here how to make social media work for them. His big point is that there's no longer a relevant difference between blogs and traditional media â the war between blogs and print journalists is over. The existence of quacks on blogs doesn't invalidate the…
February 21, 2010
Who has two thumbs and met NOAA administrator, jetsetting ecologist, and hero to policy-loving scientists Jane Lubchenco?
This guy.
It wasn't a long conversation, but we did chat about the wonders of cephalopods, the importance of science education, and similarities between creationism and global…
February 20, 2010
The organizer of this education session caught me blogging her remarks, but I didn't get sent to sit in the corner.
February 20, 2010
I'm getting ready for a session at AAAS where researchers will explore the results of the multi-national TIMSS study of science knowledge by 4th and 8th graders. They'll be comparing different US state results to draw lessons for improving science education, looking at Massachusetts and Minnesota'…
February 19, 2010
By a 36-30 vote, the South Dakota legislature recently passed House Concurrent Resolution 1009, "Calling for balanced teaching of global warming in the public schools of South Dakota."
Fans of the creation/evolution struggle will recall that the US Supreme Court in 1987 struck down a "balanced time…
February 18, 2010
Shorter Discovery Institute: Election Fundraising More Fun--and Constitutional--After Supreme Court Ruling:
Thanks to the Supreme Court, corruption is now more fun, and constitutional!
Meanwhile, real Americans hate the Supreme Court ruling in question.
February 17, 2010
I'll be at the AAAS meetings in San Diego until Monday. Leave a comment or send an email if you'll be there and want to meet up.
February 17, 2010
Martin Cothran, defender of Holocaust deniers and sometime friend to the eugenicists at the Disco. 'Tute, unleashes his inner Freudian psychoanalyst to determine that I have "logic envy." He seems to think his perverted logic is so big and beautiful that everyone else must want the same thing.
The…
February 16, 2010
Via ThinkProgress we learn that our old friend Chris Buttars has had a brainstorm about how to fix the state budget:
The sudden buzz over the relative value of senior year stems from a recent proposal by state Sen. Chris Buttars that Utah make a dent in its budget gap by eliminating the 12th grade…
February 15, 2010
Martin Cothran, enabler of racists and Holocaust deniers, doesn't like that I busted a bad argument of his. He made the trite "it's snowing so Al Gore is fat" line of argument, and I pointed out that an individual weather event doesn't actually tell you about long term trends. He retorts:
I…
February 14, 2010
Beavotron reminds us:
Via.
