I’m so over Pirates of the Caribbean now

I finally saw Pirates of the Caribbean 4: On Stranger Tides tonight, and I’ve got to say…Tim Powers was robbed. It was a mess of a movie that wobbled from point to point, with no sense behind it, and a plot that had nothing to do with what I expected.

Skip the theater and read the book, On Stranger Tides, instead. This movie could have been stunning if it had simply used that wild and thrilling story from Powers, instead of stealing only the title, giving a feeble acknowledgment (“Story suggested by Tim Powers”), and then ignoring everything in the book.

Someday, I would like to see something by Powers given the full movie treatment. If not On Stranger Tides, somebody should take a shot at The Anubis Gates, the best damn time-travel novel ever written. It would beat the pale and hackneyed writing that characterizes most SF movies nowadays, that are little more than clumsily plotted vehicles for CGI and confusingly violent action.

Also, this movie didn’t have any cephalopods in it. Not a glimpse of even a single tentacle.

Why is Silvana Koch-Mehrin being appointed to the Research Commission of the European Parliament?

This is a German scandal: Sylvana Koch-Mehrin was recently found to be guilty of extensive plagiarism in her doctoral thesis, such a blatant abuse of scholarship that the University of Heidelberg took the remarkable step of revoking her doctoral degree. Before that happened, she had been marching up the ladder of the European political cursus honorum, reaching the rank of vice-president of the European Parliament until her disgrace forced her to resign.

But now a very odd thing has happened: this ex-scholar, this impeached student, this deplorable fraud has been appointed as a full member to the Committee on Industry, Research, and Energy of the Parliament. I don’t get it. She’s screwed up so badly that she’s been tumbled out of a prime political position, so the Parliament turns around and elects her to the committee that oversees research policy? Doesn’t this suggest that the Parliament cares little for competence and integrity, but loves it some cronyism?

Scienceblogs.de has more information and a petition demanding her resignation. Support good science and science policy and throw the rascals out.

Cutting off their noses to spite their faces

Animal Aid, one of those mindless animal rights organizations, has just called on everyone in the UK to stop donating to specific medical charities, because they sponsor research that uses animals. I can sympathize with the goal of minimizing suffering in animals, but this is ridiculous: the subjects of these research programs simply can’t be approached without using animal models.

The charities targeted are Cancer Research UK, the

British Heart Foundation, the

Alzheimer’s Society and

Parkinson’s UK. If you’re in the UK, make a special effort to donate to these worthy organizations, to counter the misplaced anti-science campaign of these confused and ignorant people.

Or if you think Animal Aid is right, then how about volunteering your brains and hearts and bodies for the experimental work without which progress in treating these diseases cannot be made.

Some science journalists need to hang their heads in shame

Ben Goldacre and others carried out a very interesting study: they analyzed the top 10 UK newspapers for a week for their health reporting, and categorized the quality of the support for health claims. It’s not encouraging.

Here’s what we found: 111 health claims were made in UK newspapers over one week. The vast majority of these claims were only supported by evidence categorised as “insufficient” (62% under the WCRF system). After that, 10% were “possible”, 12% were “probable”, and in only 15% was the evidence “convincing”. Fewer low quality claims (“insufficient” or “possible”) were made in broadsheet newspapers, but there wasn’t much in it.

I do have one criticism, though. The paper is in a journal called Public Understanding of Science. It isn’t open access, though, so apparently the Public is not allowed to read about the Public Understanding of Science unless they cough up $25 per article. They can read about “science” for cheap in their local tabloid, though. Isn’t this part of the problem, too? Let’s also put part of the blame on a science publishing industry that puts up barriers to reading the real stuff.

Oh, History Channel, how much can you suck?

It’s an annoyance that the History Channel is part of the basic cable package I get — I haven’t watched the acceleratingly awful channel in years, but they still get by on their slice of the cable pie. Now they have announced that they will be turning the Bible into a “five-part, 10-hour scripted docu-drama with live-action and state-of-the-art CG”. There is no part of that description that doesn’t make me cringe.

An honest survey of the Bible wouldn’t be a bad thing — as we often say, it’s a great tool for making atheists. I don’t think that will be the case here, though.

The idea for the project came from Burnett and his wife, “Touched By An Angel” star Roma Downey, and will tell biblical stories from the old and new testaments.

Oh, man. Could this possibly get worse?

Burnett is the man behind such successful reality show franchises as “Survivor” and “The Apprentice.”

<Runs screaming from the room>

Wait…maybe this could be salvaged if they cast Donald Trump as God.

What’s wrong with the media, in one paragraph

The Atlantic runs this regular column where they ask people about their reading habits — this time, they asked Aaron Sorkin, who sneers at the web and announces that he reads a couple of newspapers…or at least, he reads the front page and the op-eds in a couple of newspapers.

When I read the Times or The Wall Street Journal, I know those reporters had to have cleared a very high bar to get the jobs they have. When I read a blog piece from “BobsThoughts.com,” Bob could be the most qualified guy in the world but I have no way of knowing that because all he had to do to get his job was set up a website–something my 10-year-old daughter has been doing for 3 years. When The Times or The Journal get it wrong they have a lot of people to answer to. When Bob gets it wrong there are no immediate consequences for Bob except his wrong information is in the water supply now so there are consequences for us.

“A very high bar”…who? David Brooks, Tom Friedman, or perhaps he is referring to Ross Douthat? With the exception of Paul Krugman, the only bar you have to clear is to be smug, rich, and obscenely privileged. And don’t get me started on the WSJ opinion pages — there, you have clear the hurdle of being so far to the right you risk being a Nazi.

This is the problem, that people blithely assume that because it is in the NY Times or the WSJ that it must be right — I’d rather read BobsThoughts.com because there, at least, poor lonely Bob must rely on the quality of his arguments rather than the prestige of his name and affiliation to persuade.

I’ll also add that when Bob throws the wrong information into the “water supply”, he’s only contaminating his own well; when Brooks or Friedman do it, they’re soaking the whole nation. And if Sorkin thinks that having a position on a big name newspaper means you’re exempt from the problem of bad information, then he’s dumber than his writing makes him sound. It was the Times and the Journal that pounded the drums of war, and fed conspiracy theories about the Clintons, to name just a few examples.

At least Bob’s opinions didn’t result in the deaths of hundreds of thousands.

Florida State University sells its integrity for $1.5 million

That’s a bargain price for throwing a reputation down the drain. FSU has turned over some hiring decisions to a billionaire ideologue.

A conservative billionaire who opposes government meddling in business has bought a rare commodity: the right to interfere in faculty hiring at a publicly funded university.

A foundation bankrolled by Libertarian businessman Charles G. Koch has pledged $1.5 million for positions in Florida State University’s economics department. In return, his representatives get to screen and sign off on any hires for a new program promoting “political economy and free enterprise.”

Traditionally, university donors have little official input into choosing the person who fills a chair they’ve funded. The power of university faculty and officials to choose professors without outside interference is considered a hallmark of academic freedom.

Under the agreement with the Charles G. Koch Charitable Foundation, however, faculty only retain the illusion of control. The contract specifies that an advisory committee appointed by Koch decides which candidates should be considered. The foundation can also withdraw its funding if it’s not happy with the faculty’s choice or if the hires don’t meet “objectives” set by Koch during annual evaluations.

This deal has been in place for a couple of years, and Koch has already meddled in at least one hiring decision, rejecting 60% of the candidates that the faculty favored. If I were a faculty member who found my choice of colleagues dictated by Koch (or Soros, or Gates, or any similar filthy rich dilettante), I’d be a bit peevish, and I don’t think the golden candidate would get much respect from his peers. On the other hand, if I were applying for a job and was rejected because I didn’t fit the ideology of the Koch brothers, I’d feel darned good and also be well satisfied that I wasn’t going to be affiliated with such a cheap brothel university.

On the third hand, if I were a graduate of the econ department of FSU, I’d be extremely embarrassed about my degree at this point.

David Rasmussen, the dean of the college of social sciences, is trying to defend the deal by saying they needed the money, an argument with which I can sympathize, since every university is struggling right now. But selling your principles of academic freedom undercuts your ability to support independent thought, and means you aren’t really a university anymore. You’re a corporate propaganda arm. Other universities, more respectable universities, have a clear understanding of that idea.

Most universities, including the University of Florida, have policies that strictly limit donors’ influence over the use of their gifts. Yale University once returned $20 million when the donor demanded veto power over appointments, saying such control was “unheard of.”

Say, Michael Ruse is at Florida State — will he condemn this policy, or will he make the same weasely excuses for it that he does for creationism?