Gary Farber, unsung prophet of the internets

I’ve been catching up with the blogs, and I’m seeing outrage over the revelation that the NSA has been carrying out wide-spectrum data mining of the American people…that it hasn’t just been surveillance of suspected terrorists. You know, if everyone would just read Gary Farber, you’d have known this five months ago. That’s how data mining works. Now people are trying to argue that we knew it all along, so it’s OK—but this is exactly what the administration has spent the last several months denying.

It’s not just the surveillance. It’s the lying. Well, the obtuseness, too.

Beautiful birds?

Crap. Coturnix tagged me with this beautiful bird meme, and I am the wrong person to ask. I don’t get out much, preferring to sit in the lab or the library, so my favorite birds are all in pieces and dead. But OK, since he asked…

The Week in Review, and an open thread

Flitting about as I have lately means I’ve been missing this, that and the other thing. So here’s a quick summary.

  • Tuesday night I was at the Café Scientifique in Minneapolis, where UMM’s Timna Wyckoff gave a talk on antibiotic resistance. It was terrific! Lots of good questions throughout, and a mob of conversation afterwards. This is exactly how these events are supposed to go.
  • I missed Michael Ruse’s talk at the UM on Wednesday—I was somewhere in Wisconsin, with a dorm room packed into a car—but I have one email report that he was entertaining but extremely aggravating. Anyone else care to say more?
  • Paul Nelson gave a talk at UCI. It sounds like the usual thing we get from Nelson.
  • A new Skeptics’ Circle has crystallized.
  • There’s an I and the Bird sighting!
  • The liberals are having a carnival!

Now I’ve got a couple of finals to give, and man, I’m exhausted. Driving to Madison and back again in one day is too much for this tired old guy—we got back about midnight last night, and then I had to drag myself out of bed at 6 to finish writing one of my exams. And then tonight…more grading.

Devonian Blues

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Lots of people have sent me links to this—thanks, all!—and it’s the perfect thing to lift me out of the finals week blahs, and it’s also just in time for Mother’s Day on Sunday: The Devonian Blues.

Every single girl and every little boy
Was born from the clan of the wayward Dipnoi
Don’t let the preacher man spoil all the fun
Took a lot more than 6 days to get the job done
Amphibians, reptiles, birds, mammals and man
All belong to the fish tribe, doncha’ understand?

Your momma was a lobefinned fish
My momma was a lobefinned fish

Sing along, everyone!

A quick one

We’re still on the road here—we’ve ducked into a place in Eau Claire for dinner, and it has free Wi-Fi!—and while sucking in the pile of email waiting for me, I see that our prom photos have arrived. Here’s me and Mary at the Geek Prom.

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Yeah, she does look better than the octopus woman from yesterday, even with the deficiency of limbs.