To quote Michael Shermer, I “investigate paranormal claims, pseudoscience and fringe groups, and cults and claims of all kinds between science and pseudoscience, and non-science, and junk science, voodoo science, pathological science, bad science, non-science, and plain old nonsense.”
Yesterday I reported that the remains of Lucy, on loan from the American Museum of Natural History to a museum in Seattle, wasn’t bringing in the business she was expected. But at least one figure from the American Museum of Natural History has managed to bring in the crowds, Neil deGrasse Tyson, Director of the Hayden Planetarium. Tyson was apparently giving a reading at the Union Square Barnes & Noble in NYC. And while I’m bummed that I didn’t know about it, it seems that I wasn’t missed as he spoke to a packed house.
And here is Rebecca Watson’s take on the above blogger’s shocked reaction at news that an astrophysicist he never heard of was so popular.
New research from Monash University bee researcher Adrian Dyer could lead to improved artificial intelligence systems and computer programs for facial recognition.
Apparently honeybees can learn to recognize human faces very well even from different viewpoints. So bees might hold the key to improving facial recognition software in computers, which currently are very poor and unreliable at distinguishing faces. Let’s just hope they don’t use it identify John Connor.
DAMN YOU, FACTS! HOW DARE YOU CONTRADICT WHAT I INSIST ON BELIEVING FOR NO GOOD REASON???!!!
This is the fourth study to look for subtle signs of mercury toxicity and show that that is not the case.
In the early 1990s, thousands of healthy Italian babies in a study of whooping cough vaccines got two different amounts of the preservative thimerosal (pronounced thih-MEHR’-uh-sawl) from all their routine shots.
Ten years later, 1,403 of those children took a battery of brain function tests. Researchers found small differences in only two of 24 measurements and those “might be attributable to chance,” they wrote in the February issue of the journal Pediatrics, which was released Monday.
Only one case of autism was found, and that was in the group that got the lower level of thimerosal.
And why is it that while in the process of whining and complaining about things not going their way because they’re insecure with having their power threatened, conservative pundits feel the need to mock the complaints of others with condescending fake crying and calling them insecure?
Why is it that conservative pundits fail to accurately characterize every controversy? He keeps saying he can’t say “prayer” but where is he pulling that bullshit? Nobody is stopping you from saying the word “prayer.” That’s not even close to what this news story is about. . .and that’s GLENN’S ENTIRE ARGUMENT!
And nobody is taking your poor, little prayer way Glenn? So don’t worry. You can still pray to your imaginary friend any time you want, so long as you don’t disrupt everyone else.
What this judge DID stop is a slimy, dishonest attempt to force prayer on everyone. If your kid wants to pray on his own, he can so long as he doesn’t disrupt the class. If you want your kid to have a moment of silence, he can do that at home. But school is for learning. And the rest of our kids shouldn’t have to waste their time simply because you want your kid to waste class time saying silent magic spells to his invisible sky daddy and because with you as a father he needed to fantasize about a better one.
Does anyone seriously believe that Glenn over here wouldn’t suddenly change his position if he found out his kids were being forced to prayer towards mecca to the god of the Muslims?
Seriously, the facts and Glenn Beck aren’t even on the same planet. And these assholes really think that you can just rename prayer by calling it “a moment of silence” that the rest of the world is too stupid to realize it’s the same thing?
I can see why Glenn decided not to have anyone on to challenge him. Both of these guys are walking advertisements for abortion.
Our 3.2 million year old remains of our ancestor Lucy, normally housed in New York City’s American Museum of Natural History, is on loan at the Pacific Science Center in Seattle, but she’s seeing nearly as many visitors as expected. The predicted number of people was 250,000 and only 60,000 showed up so far. The thought now is that this is a result of the terrible economy. Probably. Of course Seattle is also the home of the creationist “think” tank, the Discovery Institute, who deny that transitional species even exist and call Lucy a fraud.
Frequently creationists like to dodge the evidence by bringing up the claim that Charles Darwin was a racist. Their “evidence” for this comes from instances in which Darwin specifically refers to superior races. What they don’t tell you is that “races” in Darwin’s time was synonymous with “species,” and that Darwin is referring only to species that are better adapted to their environments.
But now, according to a new book, Darwin’s Sacred Cause by Adrian Desmond and James Moore, hatred of slavery drove Darwin ideas because it challenged the assumption held by many at the time that blacks and whites were separate species.
Mike Jones has been watching Ted Haggard’s recent campaign to salvage his reputation in the media as he managed to dig himself even deeper. Now he speaks out to defend “coming out” with Haggard’s hypocrisy in the first place:
But of course as we all know, Ted Haggard is completely heterosexual:
UPDATE: SINCE THE VIDEO IS NO LONGER WORKING, CLICK HERE FOR A BRIEF GLIMPSE AT THE IMAGE AND CLICK HERETO READ STEVE NOVELLA’S RESPONSE TO IT.
I think Rebecca Watson says it best:
Highlights include the gnat obviously zipping back and forth in front of the Washington Monument while the hick points out that it is actually (contrary to the video) a very large object flying behind “the obelisk.”
Though I think my favorite part is at the 1:35 mark when he admits seeing the flapping of the wings but then just dismisses it as a glitch in the video because it doesn’t conform to his insanely idiotic hypothesis.
I think somebody’s watched The Day The Earth Stood Still too many times:
Posted by mjr256 
Even space aliens love Obama
