For a while, at least, some of the kids in Florida have a shot at a non-stupid science education.
Archive for the 'Science' Category
I posted this in links yesterday, but I’m putting it here because I thought it was funny and worth more notice. I really hate these intelligent design (creationism) people and the way they continue to try and pervert science and education. Expelled and Ben Stein are even worse because they try to link Nazism and Fascism to science and evolution. Their tactics, of course, are right out of the Goebbels playbook.
The guys who did this video have a cool Stephen Colbert puppet you should check out. (via)
The legislature down there in America’s appendage passed a bill that calls for the theory of evolution (caution: may contain science-like material) to be downgraded to just contradictory noise in order to allow creationism based “intelligent design” into the classroom.
This reminds me of why I dislike Florida so.
Not only is the anti-evolution film intellectually shallow, the film is also guilty of intellectual property theft.
There are actual stupid people who take the rantings of the evolution deniers seriously. This is a movie for them.
In the new science-bashing movie Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed, Ben Stein and the rest of the filmmakers sincerely and seriously argue that Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution paved the way for the Holocaust. By “seriously,” I mean that Ben Stein acts grief-stricken and the director juxtaposes quotes from evolutionary biologists with archival newsreel clips from Hitler’s Reich. Prepare for an intellectual night at the cinema.
Bad news for innovation.
“The biggest threat to science,” writes Jennifer Washburn, is “the decline of government support … and the growing dominance of private spending over American research.” In 1965, the U.S. government funded more than 60 percent of research, while in 2006, 65 percent of research was privately funded. Even some industry leaders are concerned that basic research, which “drives innovation 10 to 15 years out,” is being shortchanged in favor of applied research focused on marketable products. Multiple analyses have shown “that the effect of industry funding on the research outcome is huge” — a particularly troubling phenomenon for medical research.
Any other explanation?
Astronomers have stumbled upon a tremendous hole in the universe. That’s got them scratching their heads about what’s just not there. The cosmic blank spot has no stray stars, no galaxies, no sucking black holes, not even mysterious dark matter. It is 1 billion light years across of nothing. That’s an expanse of nearly 6 billion trillion miles of emptiness, a University of Minnesota team announced Thursday.
Astronomers have known for many years that there are patches in the universe where nobody’s home. In fact, one such place is practically a neighbor, a mere 2 million light years away. But what the Minnesota team discovered, using two different types of astronomical observations, is a void that’s far bigger than scientists ever imagined.
“This is 1,000 times the volume of what we sort of expected to see in terms of a typical void,” said Minnesota astronomy professor Lawrence Rudnick, author of the paper that will be published in Astrophysical Journal. “It’s not clear that we have the right word yet … This is too much of a surprise.”
They’re theeeerrreeee.
The Supreme Court voted pro-environment in two recent cases, and it seems like there are a bunch more cases coming down the wire. Hold on, Justice Ginsberg. Hold on, Justice Souter.
Conservatives have made high art of the act of fake balance. In their eyes, a monkey flinging poo is the equivalent of a Nobel Prize winning mathemetician because after all - they both breathe air. This “balance” is at the heart of Fox News, and it is this “balance” that allows partisan knuckledragger drug addicts like Rush Limbaugh to be treated the same as actual journalists.
Today’s example is in Missouri, where the right has put together a few conservative celebrities to do an ad against the Missouri stem cell proposition. In their eyes, this is supposed to “balance” the powerful ad Michael J. Fox has done for Claire McCaskill (as well as Maryland’s Ben Cardin). To them the thinking is as basic as you can get - he’s a celebrity, so they get some celebrities of their own. That’s as shallow as their brains will allow them to operate.
The reason why Michael J. Fox is in this ad isn’t just because he’s Michael J. Fox. It is because he is a well known personality whose physical health is actually part of the issue at hand here. This is obvious to everyone who isn’t a conservative but to see this would require brain power they’re simply not capable of. Mr. Fox is a high profile spokesperson not because those who support stem cell research were just looking for a pitchman like how Nike or Coke hires a celebrity endorser. Fox is at the forefront of this issue because every day of his life he has to live with the effects of Parkinsons. The celebrities in the anti stem-cell ad were just picked for their conservatism, celebrity, and opposition to the issue. It does not “balance” out.
Similarly, the much beloved Christopher Reeve (a personal hero of mine, I will concede) was an advocate for stem cell research not because the mythical stem cell lobby wanted Superman to front their efforts, but because - again - he was stricken with a debilitating injury that thousands of others have and hoped for stem cell research that might be able to cure or assist him and people like him. He and Mr. Fox are not playing celebrity pitchman. They have these diseases and injuries and use and used their celebrity to raise money and awareness for a cure.
Conservatives don’t understand this. They think that a bunch of celebrities in a (poorly put together) commercial is “balance” to a man with Parkinsons who wants politicians to kick start research into a cure.
The right doesn’t get it. They never will. They are incapable.
ALSO: What happened to “shut up and sing”?
AND: Kurt Warner? The guy was phenomenal from ‘99-01 but he’s pretty much out to pasture at this point.
Michael J. Fox, Ben Cardin and the Democratic party support potentially life-saving stem cell research.
Michael Steele, George W. Bush and the Republican party do not.
These are the stakes.
But hey, Michael Steele likes puppies.
UPDATE: Wow, the Steele campaign must really want to lose.
Steele campaign spokesman Doug Heye agreed, saying he considered the ad “in extremely poor taste.”
Yes, idiot Doug Heye (who was a skybox guest of criminal lobbyist Jack Abramoff by the way), thinks that Mr. Fox is in “extremely poor taste” to support one politician who would support science that could help people with a disease like his versus one who compares it to -I’m not making this up - Nazism. How soon before Steele joins his fellow Republicans to say Mr. Fox is faking it?
Michael J. Fox supports stem cell research, and he supports Claire McCaskill.
Claire McCaskill in the Senate is a vote for stem cell research.
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