Once again, Sam Harris and Richard Dawkins do NOT speak for the atheist movement

I have written before about how broad social, political, and religious movements on the edge of social acceptance should not be closely identified with a few individuals because those supposed spokespersons often have additional baggage that is harmful to those movements. Stephen LeDrew, author of The Evolution of Atheism: The Politics of a Modern Movement warns that some prominent atheists like Sam Harris, Richard Dawkins, and the late Christopher Hitchens have, with their neoconservative political leanings, aided the rising intolerance represented by people like Donald Trump and that it is important that atheists not allow such people to be perceived as spokespersons for the broader atheist community.
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Sea lions playing volleyball

Via David Pescovitz I came across this video of sea lions playing volleyball. (I initially thought they were seals because I was not aware of the differences between seals and sea lions but this article explains it. One thing that puzzles me is that the article says that sea lions are brown but these appear to be black.) They show extremely impressive skills, even spiking the ball and using strategic placing. I was pretty bad at this sport, never quite getting the hang of how to use my hands clasped together to control the direction of the ball.
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Donald Trump gives another speech. Should we care?

Yesterday, Donald Trump gave a speech to a joint session of congress and the media today is full of analyses about what it all means. Should they bother? After all, we now know that he is a pathological liar so why should we take anything he says on major policy issues seriously? For those interested in what he said, here is an article that gives the highlights and fact-checks them. Is anyone surprised that the speech contained a lot of cherry-picked data, misleading information, and outright lies?
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Handle is an impressive robot

According to the information on the YouTube website that had the video below, this impressive robot was made by Boston Dynamics:

Handle is a research robot that stands 6.5 ft tall, travels at 9 mph and jumps 4 feet vertically. It uses electric power to operate both electric and hydraulic actuators, with a range of about 15 miles on one battery charge. Handle uses many of the same dynamics, balance and mobile manipulation principles found in the quadruped and biped robots we build, but with only about 10 actuated joints, it is significantly less complex. Wheels are efficient on flat surfaces while legs can go almost anywhere: by combining wheels and legs Handle can have the best of both worlds.

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