Turtles All the Way Down

There’s this story, you probably know it well. Some say a matron approached Bertrand Russell (or was it another scientist) after some lecture on the solar system. Dead wrong, she told ‘im. It’s a turtle. The world’s flat and carried on the back of a turtle.

And what’s the turtle standing on? the gentleman asked.

Turtles I
Turtles I

Continue reading “Turtles All the Way Down”

Turtles All the Way Down
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Crowdsourcing Foundational Freethinkers of Color

Here’s a sad fact: my shelf of pre-1930s freethinkers is overwhelmingly white, male, and Western (WMW). They’re excellent thinkers, of course, but variety is the spice of life. Not to mention, I know that not all freethinkers were WMW. The problem is this: there have been too many periods in history when WMW opinions were widely appreciated, so anyone not fitting that description was essentially shunted off to the side, ignored by all but a fringe.

I’m tired of them being ignored. I certainly don’t want to be part of the problem. And I don’t want to miss important freethinkers because I’m relying on randomly-Googled lists rather than utilizing my greatest resource: you. Continue reading “Crowdsourcing Foundational Freethinkers of Color”

Crowdsourcing Foundational Freethinkers of Color

New at Rosetta Stones: Karst! Sinkholes!

At last, something that isn’t volcanoes. Unfortunately, the subject is prompted by the fact that the earth fell away from beneath a man and killed him. I’ve attempted to explain how that happens. It doesn’t make what happened to Jeff Bush any less horrible, but hopefully it helps it be a little more comprehensible.

I quite like karst when it isn’t killing people. Karst country is often beautiful country – my favorite places in China are those lovely tower karst areas that look like they don’t belong on this planet, and one of my favorite places in Arizona is a lake in an old sinkhole. Yes, even Arizona has karst country. It’s amazing stuff.

I’ll definitely be returning to the subject of karst. Eventually. But first, I should probably get back to Mount St. Helens or we’ll never finish…

Montezuma Well, one of the most peaceful and beautiful places in the central Arizona desert. I imagine it was quite a bit less so while it was being formed. Still. Beautiful now. Image courtesy Wil Munny via Wikimedia Commons.
New at Rosetta Stones: Karst! Sinkholes!

Cryptopod: The Unseen

Something big and complicated and not volcanic is coming your way tomorrow, my darlings. I’ve been busting me arse on research, while in the midst of adjusting to medication (a story for later), and let’s just say I’m spent. So we’ll make this one short, but very sweet.

One of the things I like about photography is what I see that was previously unseen. I’ve got three quite nice little arthropods quite by accident. Continue reading “Cryptopod: The Unseen”

Cryptopod: The Unseen

Answering an Aspiring Author: Who Do I Love

The friend o’ mine embarking upon a program of self-loathing and torture bit of sci fi writing asked me about my influences, including novels and short stories. So I took a quick turn about my shelves in search of. I have lots, yet they’re only a tiny fraction of the SF universe, and tend to cluster around just a few decades and authors. So grain o’ salt, follow your own star and all that.

The list appears below, but first, I shall say a few words about reading in order to become a writer.

J.R.R. Tolkien, da morto. Image and caption courtesy Daniel Prati via Flickr.
J.R.R. Tolkien, da morto. Image and caption courtesy Daniel Prati via Flickr.

Continue reading “Answering an Aspiring Author: Who Do I Love”

Answering an Aspiring Author: Who Do I Love

Link Love, Plus Lovely Photos

The sun came out in patches today, so I saddled up the camera and headed out to that lovely spot along North Creek I found a few weeks back. Spent many hours there, and I seriously have four hundred photos to go through. You’re going to have some awesome stuff, including an educational video on the feeding behaviors of sparrows, when I’m finished.

Of course, this means that instead of writing a substantial post, I’m watching Inspector Lewis and editing photos. Good thing other folks have been writing substantial posts. We’ve certainly got enough to keep everyone out of trouble for a few hours. Continue reading “Link Love, Plus Lovely Photos”

Link Love, Plus Lovely Photos

The Art of Nature, Iguana Edition

Sometimes, you see a photo featured somewhere and you know you must share it with your friends and readers.

Iguana at Butterfly World, Stellenbosch, Western Cape Province, South Africa. Photo and caption courtesy Leo za1 / © Rute Martins of Leoa's Photography / CC-BY-SA-3.0.
Iguana at Butterfly World, Stellenbosch, Western Cape Province, South Africa. Photo and caption courtesy Leo za1 / © Rute Martins of Leoa’s Photography / CC-BY-SA-3.0 via Wikimedia Commons.

Isn’t that wonderful? I look at that face and see an ode to evolution right there – a symphony of natural processes and natural history.It reminds me of what RQ said on our most recent installment of Friday Freethought:

Because something that assembles itself is so much cooler than something built – a painting by an artist can be wonderful and impressive, but you’ll always know that someone took the time to learn to paint, put the colours together, think of the design, etc. But imagine a painting that comes to be on its own – through random processes! How impressive would that be? Like the crystallization of water into snowflakes. Or the Mandelbrot leaves on that plant last week. Or the way cold fronts and warm fronts can combine to make a giant, organized hurricane. So much more awesome than just saying, [entity] did it. To me, anyways…

I’ve seen nature paint. I’ve seen it paint in space, where stars are born and where they die. I’ve seen it paint on still water on sunny days. Continue reading “The Art of Nature, Iguana Edition”

The Art of Nature, Iguana Edition

Friday Freethought: “Nothing Can be Mysterious Enough to Become an Explanation”

It’s the same arguments over and over and over… I was having a discussion with someone I quite like and respect recently, wherein he told me that he believed some god or other must exist because he couldn’t believe this whole big universe could come from nothing.

Shell of gas around carbon star U Camelopardalis. Image courtesy ESA/Hubble, NASA and H. Olofsson (Onsala Space Observatory).
Shell of gas around carbon star U Camelopardalis. Image courtesy ESA/Hubble, NASA and H. Olofsson (Onsala Space Observatory).

I understand. I was there, once, believing the same thing: how could all this something come from nothing? Couldn’t possibly. Therefore, some god or other. I’d not faced that idea squarely: I’d not asked the crucial question. Continue reading “Friday Freethought: “Nothing Can be Mysterious Enough to Become an Explanation””

Friday Freethought: “Nothing Can be Mysterious Enough to Become an Explanation”