Trust the internet to lower the bar again.
Pharyngula
Evolution, development, and random biological ejaculations from a godless liberal
Trust the internet to lower the bar again.
Not mine—the weirder and more peculiar the food, the more likely I am to snarf it down—but those of certain other members of the Myers clan whose identities I will abstain from mentioning, lest they decide to add some really interesting ingredients to my next meal. Anyway, it’s an interesting study that explains why some people get queasy at the thought of food “touching”—it’s a common response to fear of contamination. It’s basically documenting the psychological reality of cooties.
Now if only he had provided an explanation for how to overcome it — the prohibition on mixing too many flavors in our meals is constraining the menu too much around here.
This is an ugly story, and it’s ugly on both sides. First, rude students make a nasty, mocking video of one of their teachers and post it to YouTube, which is bad enough; these are kids who definitely need some discipline. But then the school district suspends the students for 40 days in punishment. Forty days is almost a quarter of the school year. They deserved a harsh response, but kicking them out of school just deprives them of the education they need, and they’re probably going to regard it as a vacation.
I must confess, though, that what first caught my eye about the story is that it’s from Kent, Washington — where I grew up. I read it wondering if it was my alma mater, Kent-Meridian High School, that was going to be the scene of the crime…and no, it wasn’t. It was Kentridge, our hated cross-town rivals, the school that was even more despised than Auburn. I felt relief.
It’s funny how those silly scholastic enmities can come back to you after 30 years…
This week, the creationist Ken Ham and his organization, Answers in Genesis, are practicing the Big Lie. They have spent tens of millions of dollars to create a glossy simulacrum of a museum, a slick imitation of a scientific enterprise veneered over long disproved religious fables, and they are gathering crowds and world-wide attention to the grand opening of their edifice of deceit. You can now take a photographic tour of the exhibits and see for yourself—it’s not science at all, but merely a series of Bible stories dolled up in dioramas.
The blogosphere is also giving them some attention — almost none of it favorable. What I’ve done here is collect recent reactions from all over to the Creation Museum, and compile them down into a link and a short and (I hope) representative extract. Browse through this long, long list, and when you find some quote that tickles your interest, follow the link to find the complete article. The National Center for Science Education has also compiled reactions from journalists, educators, scientists, and scientific organizations for yet more reading on the subject.
I’d planned to have that Creation Museum carnival done early this morning, but the response has been huge—I’ve culled it down to about 65 entries, and I’m busily trying to sort them out in some semblance of order, so it’ll be a little longer. Have patience.
Boy, you guys really hate Ken Ham’s Propaganda Palace. It warms me right down to the black, empty void at my heart, where I think the temperature might have risen to a whole tenth of a degree above absolute zero.
He told on me! That wicked rat-fink has
reported me to the provost of my university, and now I’m a-tremblin’ in my pajamas. Here’s the text of the letter he claims to have sent in, revealing my perfidy to the administration.
(via 3quarksdaily)
A reader sent in a request that I post a reply to an old article. How old? From June 2005. I’d almost forgotten this old quack, but Cindy Lee had to remind me.
Fresh off his earthshaking debunking of the whole of evolutionary biology with his classic “banana” and “coke can” arguments, Ray Comfort has a compelling new argument against atheism: the electricity argument. It’s a little story about “three wise fools” who are exposed to electricity for the first time, and who refuse to believe in this amazing invisible force, and refuse even to test it. Obviously, the “wise fools” are supposed to be modern scientists, and the invisible force they refuse to acknowledge is a god. Comfort tells the tale to make the scientists look like obstinate idiots who refuse to look at the evidence in the natural world and instead make rabbinical arguments about authorities and texts and…hey, wait a minute! Who’s being parodied here?
Anyway, his parable is a patent lie, and he completely misrepresented the events in the encounter. I know. I was there. The full and accurate transcript of the actual test follows.
It’s a friend with a face full of necrotizing venom, which just makes him a little more special, I think. Anyway, it’s a good story about a responsible, rational reaction to finding a brown recluse spider in the house, and the little guy is so darned cute, too.
