Many carnivals to keep you distracted on St Patrick’s Day!
Pharyngula
Evolution, development, and random biological ejaculations from a godless liberal
Many carnivals to keep you distracted on St Patrick’s Day!
If a little knowledge is a dangerous thing, the insignificant, minute information Adams has on evolution must be exceedingly risky—it’s like the atom bomb of ignorance. In this case, it’s not entirely his fault, though. He read the recent Newsweek cover story on evolution, which fed his biases and readily led him smack into the epicenter of his own blind spots, and kerblooiee, he exploded.
This is a case where the flaws in a popular science article neatly synergize with an evolution-denialist’s misconceptions to produce a perfect storm of stupidity.
Little things can expose serious injustice. For example, this story about two women being thrown out of a restaurant for a kiss…we need reminders like this that discrimination is real, and it hurts people.
There is no federal law prohibiting discrimination based on sexual orientation. Neither Kansas nor Missouri are among the few states that protect gay people from being discriminated against in areas of employment, housing and public accommodations.
Kansas City does have an ordinance protecting gays, as do St. Louis, Columbia and University City. But if you’re anywhere else in Missouri and you’re gay, you can legally be denied service in restaurant. Landlords can refuse to rent you a place to live.
You can even be canned from your job on the suspicion that you’re romantically inclined toward members of your own sex.
(via Daily Irreverence)
My latest column for Seed, Variant Genes-in-Waiting, is now online. If you subscribed, you would have already read it earlier this week.
By the way, my mom subscribes, too, and she gives it a thumbs up. I’ll have to find out what she thinks about my next column, which is all about beetle testes (and that’s all you get to know about it—you’ll just have to wait).
It’s been a busy day—if you’ve noticed it’s been quiet here, it’s because I’ve been driving back and forth to St Cloud to help my son get situated in his new apartment, and also, by the way, today is our wedding anniversary — note that my wife cleverly scheduled it to be exactly one week after my birthday, making reminders easy.
I was going to make some lecherous joke about getting lucky tonight, but it would be superfluous since I seem to have been in luck for twenty seven years.
Trust me, this is really good — it gets it all exactly right.
The latest Nature reveals a new primitive mammal fossil collected in the Mesozoic strata of the Yan mountains of China. It’s small and unprepossessing, but it has at least two noteworthy novelties, and first among them is that it represents another step in the transition from the reptilian to the mammalian jaw and ear.
Don’t rush to get tickets to New Zealand just yet—the colossal squid is frozen in a block of ice, and they don’t plan to even start thawing it for another year (there aren’t any other reasons to visit NZ than to see the squid, right?).
To minimise handling of the precious specimen, the colossal squid will probably have its temperature raised, over days, in the tank in which it will finally be “fixed”.
“We don’t want to move it too much,” says Marshall.
“When a thing like that is in the water, it’s neutrally buoyant.
“But, of course, when you get it out of the water, you’ve got a big lump of weight and you could try lifting it and your hands would go right through.
“Already it’s got puncture marks from the net.”
Once un-frozen, the creature will be fixed, or embalmed, and then a long-term preservative will be used.
“What I mean by a fixing tank is a tank that you lay it out in, in a natural position, and you then make all the adjustments – align all the arms, pack out the body and all of that. Then you have it in a, say, 5% formalin solution.
“It will require the biggest tank of anything we’ve got.”
Basically, we’re not going to know any more details for a good long while.
Garrison Keillor has done it again: he’s written another insipid article loaded with casual bigotry, this time against gays. I’m pleased to see that Dan Savage has savaged him, so I don’t need to go on at length.
However, this really isn’t the first time Keillor has done this—he has a history of unthinking stereotyping and rejection of gays and atheists. He’s an excellent example of why, when I see the Religious Right and the Religious Left, I don’t think the problem is the Right or Left…it’s the Religious.
My criticism of Keillor from 2005 is below the fold. Not only does he reject atheism and homosexuality, but he does so on the most trivial grounds—gay people want to get married to economize on their wardrobe? It’s nuts.
