Realitology
“The Study of Reality”
Warning! This Blog Contains Social Commentary, Brilliant Observations, Dry Wit, and Rampant Sarcasm. Use At Your Own Risk.
Posted Philosophy, Politics, Psychology, Religion, Science, Society on Saturday, September 13th, 2008. Comments(1)
One more installment in my recent anti-religion tirades…
I recently finished the book "Irreligion: A Mathematician Explains Why the Arguments for God Just Don’t Add Up" by Jonh Allen Paulos.
It’s an interesting little book that, through mathematics, quite adeptly destroys all sorts of the supposed "logical" arguments for god. Regardless of the religious implications of the book, the author really lays out probability and mathematical principles in easy to understand ways. It was particularly fascinating to me how many things we see around us every day are hugely improbable statistically, yet they happen with great regularity.
Here’s a case in point…
I suppose everyone knows that creationism (the belief that a mystical sky fairy [god] created the universe) has been rebranded as "intelligent design" (ID). There’s been a new PR campaign in the world (mainly USA) to try to "prove" its validity and hold it up as an equal (or better) explanation than natural selection (evolution), and to have it taught in public schools.
Since there is of course no logical or scientific evidence of "intelligent design" [a 2000 year old story book which claims itself infallible is not evidence] , the best argument its supporters can come up with is that the probability that the world as we know it evolved from natural selection is highly unlikely.
Of course their whole "thought" process is severely flawed and show that its supporters have no knowledge of science and no concept of natural selection. They start out with the idea that the universe as it is now was the "goal" of evolution, rather than realizing that there was no end goal, only a starting place with an incomprehensible number of possible changes and outcomes which occurred over billions of years and ended up with what we have now. In other words it wasn’t planned to be this way it just ended up this way as a result of miniscule changes over billions of years.
But anyway, back the idea that the probability of the universe being this way is so unlikely as to be impossible. Paulos give a great illustration of things with an a seeming infinitesimal probability of occurring, occurring nonetheless.
Would you say that the odds of something having a 1 in 1068 probability of occurring would be small? Infinitesimal even? Would something with those sorts of odds ever occur? Just so we’re clear on the number; 1068 is 1 with 68 zeros after it. In other words something having a
1 in 100,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000
chance of occurring. It seems like something like that could never happen.
Well, if you shuffle a deck of 52 cards there is a 1 in 1068 chance of the cards ending up in any particular order. So every time you shuffle a deck of cards the order that the cards ended up in had a tiny 1 in 1068 chance of occurring, and yet it obviously did occur.
You would be justified in concluding that the probability that the cards ended up in that particular order was infinitesimal, but you would not be justified in concluding that since the odds were so small that it could not have possibly occurred. That my friends is what creationists try to do.
Simply because the a priori [rough translation: before the fact] chance of something happening is tiny, you can’t conclude that it could not have possibly occurred. When you shuffle cards they have to end up in some order. Regardless of the probability of any one particular order occurring, one particular order will occur. You cannot logically conclude that the possibility of moving from one order to another via shuffling is so improbable as to be impossible.
So how do we put this back into the real world of natural selection? Simply this: when an organism reproduces, the cards are reshuffled and any number of possible genetic changes will occur (as demonstrated by the fact that every offspring is not a perfect clone.) This particular genetic reshuffling that ends up was itself highly improbable to have occurred, but yet it did occur.
Genetics is of course much more complex than a deck of cards. When genes are shuffled there can be mutations which lead to more possibilities of changes in organisms. If you had a deck of cards that changed a tiny bit with every shuffle eventually it would not look like the deck you started out with. The possibilities of changes would increase the longer you shuffled the deck. If everyone of the 6 billion people on earth shuffled a similar deck then the number of change would grow exponentially. If they passed down their deck of cards to their offspring and the offspring continued to shuffle the deck over their lifetime then then the changes could grow even more exponentially. And if that continued for billions of years then the number of changes would continue to grow exponentially.
Something simple can end up incredibly complex with tiny changes over long periods of time.
That in a nutshell is natural selection.
1- organisms reproduce
2- the offspring is slightly different that its parents
3- that offspring reproduces
4- Its offspring are slightly different that it is
5- ad infinitum
The evidence is right in front of our faces, we witness it every time a child is born and yet some people still want to claim that it doesn’t happen. As I’ve said before, someone who consistently doesn’t believe what they see happening with their very eyes, and who denies reality, is detached (brainwashed by beliefs) from reality. It’s sad on a human level, but it’s incredibly dangerous on a societal level to have people making decisions based on superstition and non-reality.
This whole deck of cards/number analogy thing was based on about 2 pages of Paulos’ book. If you read the whole book you’ll find many more "arguments" for god debunked. It’s a pretty entertaining read. Don’t be put off by "mathematics" in the title.
Posted Religion, Science, Society on Friday, September 12th, 2008. Comments(1)
As if to punctuate yesterday’s post about no more religious nuts in politics, I received further proof that religious nuts are not connected to reality.
I got this chain email entitled "god’s pharmacy". It’s so laughably simple-minded and unintelligent that you’d almost think it was made to be funny, not to PROVE how smart god is.
Here it is in all its glory (no pun intended).
(My smart-ass comments in red)
A friend sent this to me. It’s been said that God first separated the salt water from the fresh, made dry land, planted a garden, made animals and fish… all before making a human. He made and provided what we’d need before we were born. These are best & more powerful when eaten raw. We’re such slow learners…
God left us a great clue as to what foods help what part of our body!
God’s Pharmacy! Amazing!A sliced Carrot looks like the human eye. The pupil, iris and radiating lines look just like the human eye… and YES, science now shows carrots greatly enhance blood flow to and function of the eyes.
And an unsliced carrot it looks like a horse dick, so what? Pretty much anything round "looks" like the human eye if you’re going to use that broad of a brush. No, "carrots" don’t enhance blood flow to the eyes; that would be vitamin A primarily to which you’re trying to refer. And as far as I know vitamin A’s benefits don’t come from enhanced blood flow.
And by the way…vitamin A is found in many other foods in greater concentrations than in carrots—the top one being cod liver oil. I don’t know…does a cod liver look like the human eye?
A Tomato has four chambers and is red. The heart has four chambers and is red. All of the research shows tomatoes are loaded with lycopine and are indeed pure heart and blood food.
OK first, it’s "lycopene" not "lycopine". And ummm, actually tomatoes contain between 2-20 chambers depending on the variety. They’re green when they’re first "born" by the way. Just like the human heart right? (Or maybe that was the Grinch?) They might also be yellow, orange, pink, and dark purple to black. [I’ll leave others to make the black hearted jokes.]
Grapes hang in a cluster that has the shape of the heart. Each grape looks like a blood cell and all of the research today shows grapes are also profound heart and blood vitalizing food.
That’s the shape of heart? Uh, I guess so if you want to stretch your imagination…and selectively prune a bunch of grapes. Looks like a blood cell? Here we go again with that magical-god-proving-circular-shape? Good for your heart? Well Lordy-Be! Them there are anti-oxidants, which in addition to being found in other foods in much greater concentrations, are primarily found in grape SEEDS. And since that’s a picture of THOMPSON SEEDLESS GRAPES, they don’t have any freakin’ seeds anyway.
Here’s another bunch of grapes I found. Who’s heart is that shaped like Farmer Brown?A Walnut looks like a little brain, a left and right hemisphere, upper cerebrums and lower cerebellums. Even the wrinkles or folds on the nut are just like the neo-cortex. We now know walnuts help develop more than three (3) dozen neuron-transmitters for brain function.
Actually I always thought a walnut kind of looks like the wrinkly skin on your testicles when it’s cold. Maybe that’s just me.
Looks like a little brain? Well a little anthropomorphic projection never hurt anyone.
And by the way Freud, they’re not "neuron-transmitters" they’re "neurotransmitters"…and it’s the omega 3 fatty acids found in walnuts that are good for the brain. In fact flax seeds have 3x the amount of omega 3s found in walnuts. I submit that the size and shape of a flax seed more closely resembles the brain of whoever wrote this idiotic email. –>
Kidney Beans actually heal and help maintain kidney function and yes, they look exactly like the human kidneys.
"…and yes, they look exactly like the human kidneys. " — No Shit Sherlock! That’s because they were NAMED AFTER HUMAN KIDNEYs not the other way around.
Celery, Bok Choy, Rhubarb and many more look just like bones. These foods specifically target bone strength. Bones are 23% sodium and these foods are 23% sodium. If you don’t have enough sodium in your diet, the body pulls it from the bones, thus making them weak. These foods replenish the skeletal needs of the body.
"Celery, Bok Choy, Rhubarb and many more look just like bones." — So does a fucking stick Hippocrates! Go eat one of those.
Avocados, Eggplant and Pears target the health and function of the womb and cervix of the female – they look just like these organs. Today’s research shows that when a woman eats one avocado a week, it balances hormones, sheds unwanted birth weight, and prevents cervical cancers. And how profound is this? It takes exactly nine (9) months to grow an avocado from blossom to ripened fruit. There are over 14,000 photolytic chemical constituents of nutrition in each one of these foods (modern science has only studied and named about 141 of them).
"Avocados, Eggplant and Pears target the health and function of the womb and cervix of the female – they look just like these organs." Hey if your pussy’s green like an avocado or purple like an eggplant you need to get that looked at.
Figs are full of seeds and hang in twos when they grow. Figs increase the mobility of male sperm and increase the numbers of Sperm as well to overcome male sterility.
Wow they’re full of seeds. Simply amazing! They must be the only fruit in the world to be full of seeds. And they hang in twos? Damn, you got me there buckwheat! You know what’s really sperm-and-nut-like about figs…it’s that they’re full of fig wasp larva…yum…you’re eating wasp jizz. Gee thanks god.
Sweet Potatoes look like the pancreas and actually balance the glycemic index of diabetics.
Ohh this stuff is starting to make my head hurt…
Olives assist the health and function of the ovaries
Who has that many ovaries? With leaves too?
Oranges, Grapefruits, and other Citrus fruits look just like the mammary glands of the female and actually assist the health of the breasts and the movement of lymph in and out of the breasts.
They look "just like" the mammary glands? What? Orange, yellow, and bumpy on the outside? Not like any mammary glands I’ve ever seen.
No, actually the mammary glands don’t look anything like that. The BREASTS might look a little like them though. Actually, I always preferred "mammary glands" that were cantaloupe and watermelon sized. Plus when those lemon titties squirt in your eye it burns like the dickens.
Onions look like the body’s cells. Today’s research shows onions help clear waste materials from all of the body cells. They even produce tears which wash the epithelial layers of the eyes. A working companion, Garlic, also helps eliminate waste materials and dangerous free radicals from the body.
Hey wait a minute…I thought you said grapes looked like a blood cell? What’s going on here god?
" They even produce tears which wash the epithelial layers of the eyes." So does a kick in the nuts, and since onions look like nuts, ipso facto god planned it that way.
You know what else washes the epithelial layers of the eyes? Mustard gas! That is until you puke blood and cough up your lungs. I’d say you got a little carried away with the symbolism there god!
SUBJECT: Psalm 46:10
‘Be Still and Know that I AM GOD’
Please don’t break this even if you only send it to one person. Look at the date when this was started. Thanks.
So there you go you doubting Thomas…proof of god’s divine plan right there in the Safeway produce aisle. But I’m sure Sarah Palin already knew that.
Posted American Dream, Business, Consumerism, Economics, Energy, Environment, Global Warming, Nature, Politics, Science, Society on Tuesday, August 12th, 2008. Comments(0)
More scare tactics from the anti-facts/reality/science wing of the conservative movement.
A while back I received an email with the subject line of "Lies Vs. Truth". It was one of those chain emails that right-wing type folks so often seem to send around. (I assume it’s the same demographic who "learns" about politics by talk-radio, because I never receive any left-slanted chain emails.)
The gist of the email was that all of our oil problems would be solved and that prices would go down by a huge amount if only we’d drill in ANWR. It showed pictures of the tundra, which it labeled a "wasteland" and insinuated that since it wasn’t pretty, it wasn’t valuable to anyone so we might as well drill and what’s the big deal. It also showed a herd of caribou within a couple miles of a drilling facility and a polar bear standing atop the oil pipeline. The inherent message was "see the animals are fine, what’s the problem."
It was your typical diatribe about how "the liberals" are ruining the world, blaming Al Gore for high gas prices, and other emotional rather than fact-based "reasoning". Your typical Rush Limbaugh type of hype—long on hot air, short on facts.
I deleted that email as I usually do with this sort of crap, but something gnawed at me for a couple of days. I couldn’t bare the thought of someone’s opinion actually being swayed but that load of rubbish. I couldn’t bare the thought of more uninformed idiots making political and environmental choices based on this load of hogwash.
Not that I though it would do much good, but I replied with the following email….
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Sorry I just couldn’t let this load of half-truths and innuendo go by without, as Paul Harvey used to say, "The rest of the story."
I don’t care to get into a big argument about anything but I can’t bear the thought of people making actual political decisions based on scare tactics from a hyped-up email.
Lies vs. Truth? Hmmmm. I don’t see any facts in that email, just name calling and fear-mongering.
So lets look at some actual facts…
But first, why does this type of crap always have to demonize people and reduce them to a label like "the democrats", "liberals", "greens", etc? There are people with views different than your own obviously. Labeling them and reducing them to a stereotype instead of a real human being makes them easier to hate. That’s the whole reason for it. Anyone who’s intellectually honest knows that regardless of the political/social/economical/ leanings there’s plenty of BS, slant, and lies to go around. To act as if "your side" has all the answers, is perfect, never lies, and has a lock on virtue is completely dishonest and is a disservice to democracy.
We all personally deal with people one on one who think differently than we do and we generally treat them with courtesy and respect. I don’t think most of us walk around all day yelling at people and calling them names do we? Why then do people do it emails? I guess it’s impersonal and if they’re just "a [insert your hated stereotype here]" then they’re not really a human being and so are OK to insult? Maybe I just look at people differently than some folks do…
But since the email demonized the "liberals" and "greens" I’ll assume that it was written from a "conservative" and "republican" point of view and respond accordingly.
Why is ANWR such a political football anyway? The amount of oil there is very small. According to the US Department of Energy, United States Energy Information Administration:
"Additional oil production resulting from the opening of ANWR would be only a small portion of total world oil production, and would likely be offset in part by somewhat lower production outside the United States. The opening of ANWR is projected to have its largest oil price reduction impacts as follows: a reduction in low-sulfur, light crude oil prices of $0.41 per barrel (2006 dollars) in 2026 for the low oil resource case, $0.75 per barrel in 2025 for the mean oil resource case, and $1.44 per barrel in 2027 for the high oil resource case, relative to the reference case."
Wow! Drilling in ANWR would have the huge impact of reducing oil prices by 41 cents a barrel…in 2026! It would take at least 10-15 years to even get the oil fields set up so in only 18 short years from now we could be looking at a savings of 41 cents a barrel! Wow, that awesome. I’m sure that would translate to maybe 1 cent reduction in gas prices.
But again, any oil produced in anwr is at least 10-15 years away anyway. It does nothing to change gas prices today and in 18-20 years from now it’s still only a tiny, tiny, change at all. In other words it’s not worth it financially.
And look, what we’re really seeing here are the last gasp efforts of junkies. Think of a heroin addict. They do more and more desperate things to get their fix. They rob their neighbors, they let their kids go hungry, they prostitute themselves. It’s the same thing now with oil. US oil production peaked in the late 60s to early 70s. World oil production has peaked within the last few years as well. There’s less oil and more people who want it so the price goes up.
Seems to me that republicans/conservatives are always talking about the virtues of the free market, free from the restraints of rules and laws. Well here it is–the free market in action. How do you like it? Was it all that you hoped it would be?
And speaking of the free market, the email mentioned gas taxes and said that Al Gore and the democrats wanted to raise gas prices. Just so you know, the main reason our roads and infrastructure is falling apart is that fuel taxes do not even come close to paying for the costs of building and maintaining roads (which they’re supposed to do). So by the logic of getting rid of government meddling and distorting the markets, fuel taxes would probably need to be raised by 4 or 5 times higher so that they would actually cover it. As much as high gas prices suck, you’ve got to pay for the roads and the fuel taxes are supposed to pay for that. Use the roads more, wear them out more, pay more to fix them. That’s the way it’s supposed to be but fuel taxes have been kept artificially low because of weak political stomachs. The true costs are hidden and that’s not free market.
The point is we’re behaving like desperate junkies. Sure you can keep doing more and more desperate things to get your fix but sooner or later you’ve either got to pull the needle out of your arm or you’re going to die. This all could have been avoided but certain factions and political parties have consistently voted against energy efficiency and alternative forms of energy [read conservatives/republicans]. So US, you’ve got exactly what you voted for. Stop complaining. Or do something about it. Kick the habit!
So then the email went on to show photos of what it termed a "barren wasteland". We don’t even know if those are actual photos of the land in question. Regardless, just because you may not think that it looks "pretty" does not mean it’s a "barren wasteland". I’m sure the animals and plants that live there don’t consider it so. Not to mention the people who have depended on that sort of land to live and hunt for the last 10,000-15,000 years.
Aren’t conservatives always going on about "property rights" and "takings"? Well there are 50 indigenous groups of people who are opposed to drilling in anwr because of the havoc that it would wreak on their lives. So how do you square that? Is it ok for a government "taking" just so some corporation can profit? Yes, believe it or not there are still some people up there who try to live a traditional life which depends on the health of the caribou, the fish, and the land for them to survive. Or would you rather just say screw the land and animals and have the people go on welfare?
The email goes on to act as if they want just this tiny little part of the land, so what’s the big deal right?
OK here’s where they’re already drilling in Alaska
Here’s where they’re already allowed to drill on the north slope.
See that tiny piece of land at the top right? That anwr where they want to expand oil drilling.
The point is that drilling is already allowed on 95% of the north slope! All we’re talking about is allowing a mere 5% to go unmolested. Can’t it be OK to just leave a tiny bit alone? Can’t we leave just a bit of land that we don’t rape and pillage? Or is our only value corporate profits? Isn’t there more to life than that? Seems like there are a few choice bible verses that say so. Something about "the love of money…"
Then the email shows caribou and a bear near the oil rigs. So what? Where the hell else are they going to go? That’s where they live. But you can bet that having all of that industrialization is certainly not doing them any good.
Here’s a nice animal photo for you. It’s our national symbol of freedom and liberty being scrubbed of oil from the Exxon Valdez disaster.
Whoops, here’s a couple of critters that didn’t make it.
Thousands of animals died immediately; the best estimates include 250,000 to as many as 500,000 seabirds, at least 1,000 sea otters, approximately 12 river otters, 300 harbor seals, 250 bald eagles, and 22 orcas, as well as the destruction of billions of salmon and herring eggs.
Whoops!
So let’s not forget the ole Exxon Valdez disaster. It’s 20 years later and the area is not even close to recovering.
Here’s some current data from a USA today article:
According to a study out Feb. 15 in the journal Environmental Science and Technology, scientists from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), the U.S. Geological Survey and Alaskan agencies found that oil levels in the sands around the sound are much the same as they were when tests were done five years ago. The study says oil has seeped down 4 to 10 inches.
Seventeen years ago, scientists predicted that the oil would be long gone by now. "We expected the natural decay rate was 25% a year. But very little of the oil actually disappeared," says Jeffrey Short, a NOAA research chemist. "What’s left is going to be there a long time."
Instead, the researchers estimate, the oil is "weathering" away at a rate of 3% to 4% a year. "It will be readily detectable for decades," Short says.
The herring fisheries collapsed. Salmon have not recovered. So 34,000 fisherman and others have lost their livelihood because of the Valdez disaster. 34,000! So what are they supposed to do? Just screw them too and let them go on welfare?
Yeah, yeah, it could never happen again. Easy for you to say when you don’t live up there and depend on it for your life isn’t it? What’s the risk to you? Out of site out of mind right? If you don’t know them personally then they don’t matter. As long as you get what you want then screw everybody else. That’s the attitude I guess. Never mind that it doesn’t make economic sense. It make good political grist for the mill.
But seriously, passing around those stupid political hack-job emails does no one any good. All it does is stir up resentment and hatred. Don’t base your political or other decisions on crap you read in an email and don’t just forward them along like a robot. Read the facts, inform yourself, separate the fact from the hype, and then make your own decision.
That’s democracy in action regardless of if you’re a liberal or a conservative. That’s what we need–people thinking for themselves based on facts, not emotions and fear.
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The guy who sent me the email was pissed that I responded. I guess he doesn’t like facts that don’t fit into his political leanings. He had no rebuttal of the facts, how could he. Facts are facts. His only response was that he guesses if it would take 10 years to get oil out of ANWR that we should have started drilling 10 years ago. I guess he’s not bothered by the fact that the oil in ANWR might lower gas prices less than a penny a gallon and would screw up one of the last remaining un-raped pieces of land. Wow. Talk about selfish. He’s a good right-wing christian though so I’m sure jesus would agree that harming many for the tiny benefit of a few is ok. I think that’s in the good book somewhere. "Fuck them that may be harmed by thine actions if thou shall save a few shekels."
Most of the people who responded (there were many cc’d on the original email) thanked me for telling the other side of the story. One was an oil man who had worked up on the north slope. He said I was right on and that he agreed that we shouldn’t drill there even though drilling in anwr would bring him more money. One conservative-type said that I had raised some good points "from the liberal perspective". Again, I don’t know how facts can be liberal or conservative, but some folks feel the need to see the world with an "us against them" mentality. Sad. That’s most of the problem right there.
I don’t know if it did any good but I feel better. Hopefully at least a few people dropped their dogma and looked at the facts. I ain’t countin’ on it though…
Posted Consumerism, Environment, Nature, Philosophy, Politics, Religion, Science, Society on Wednesday, December 19th, 2007. Comments(4)
As if hunting and eating them was not enough, those wacky Japanese have decided to also humiliate whales by making them wear Santa Hats. Now this definitely IS anthrophomorphism.
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Hunting ships are already on their way to the icy reaches of the Southern Ocean, where this year’s catch of 1,000 will include humpbacks for the first time in 40 years.
The hunting expedition also plans to kill 50 fin whales, the world’s second largest animal after blue whales, as 850 smaller minke whales.
Wildlife officials say the display of the white belugas wearing Santa hats is both sad and ironic against the background of the Antarctic hunts, due to start in the region after Christmas.
"While whales are being used for entertainment in Japan, the Japanese fleet is subjecting whales to a cruel death in the Southern Ocean," said Mr Darren Kindleysides, a Sydney-based campaigner for the International Fund for Wildlife.
"Sadly, the aquarium owners seem to be showing as little respect for whales as their Government."
An Australian whale-watching official, Mr Peter Lynch, said the aquarium display was disrespectful to the whales, adding: "The real irony lies in the fact that the general population in Japan have no idea what’s going on in Antarctica."
However, the Australian government will be casting a different eye over the activities of the Japanese whalers in Antarctica – it plans to send a former P&O cruise ship, now converted into an armed vessel, to the region to monitor the hunting.
Following high-level talks, the vessel, Oceanic Viking, which has a reinforced hull to cut through ice, will be leased to the government to track the Japanese whaling ships and keep a check on their activities.
The crew is trained for polar conditions and they will use ‘super-telephoto’ lenses to record the whale slaughter.
In addition, the ship will have two .50-calibre machine guns manned by a customs boarding party should a clash of any kind with the Japanese vessels occur.
Australia’s new Labour Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, has accused the former John Howard government of doing nothing to save the endangered whales, adding that nobody took seriously Japan’s claim that it was conducting scientific research. full story…
"Scientific Research" my blowhole!
OK really I can’t say making the whales wear santa hats is particularly cruel (certainly not worse than wrenching them from their home and forcing them to live in a tiny cage and stop communicating with each other because they’ll go deaf from the sounds bouncing around the container) . In fact I’m sure the whales are having a good laugh at the dork standing next to them.
But really, this is just another stupid example of how people use and abuse other animals for their amusement. It’s just a "thing", not a living being with feelings and sensitivity or anything. It’s just a little play thing. AAAARRRRRGGGGGHHHHH!
And the Japanese have got to be the worst at it with all that cutsey hello kitty, pokemon, raping little girls manga crap. Their culture is just fucking weird in that way. (And yes I know plenty of Japanese. I’m married to one in fact.) They live in a fucking dream world in certain ways. They’re still taught that America was the aggressor in world war 2, they know nothing about the rape of Nan King (but that’s a different post.)
On the positive side, you can buy beer and porno magazines in vending machines in Japan. And they have the best and most high-tech toilets in the world. You’ve not taken a proper shit until you’ve shit on a Japanese toilet and had it clean your asshole with water and then blow dry it. No wiping! No Muss! No Fuss! But honestly I don’t have the patience to wait for the air dryer. It takes too long, just like a hand dryer. Plus I don’t want to get a chapped anus! Do they make ass-chap-stick?
(FREE TIP: Make sure you don’t press the "ladies wash" button by mistake or you’ll get your nuts and/or vagina showered instead of your bunghole. That is of course unless your nuts and/or vagina need cleansing then by all means press that button.)
Where the hell was I? Oh yeah cruelty to animals…My wife said they used to eat whale meat at school lunch. Isn’t that nifty. Really we westerners can’t bitch too much about whale killing. I mean, how many billions of chickens, cows, and pigs do we kill and eat? (By "we" I mean you carnivores out there.)
Man I really don’t even know what to say. The absurdity boggles the mind. OK, how about some more humiliating photos then?
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Posted Nature, Science on Monday, December 17th, 2007. Comments(0)
This is some amazing stuff. A fascinating work of science. If they would teach science this way in school (emphasizing fun, practical, and/or offbeat applications) then more kids would pay attention in school.
Why pregnant women don’t tip over
There seems to be more keeping pregnant women upright than fear of toppling over and squishing their unborn child. Researchers from Harvard University and the University of Texas at Austin examined 19 pregnant women and discovered a number of reinforcements in their backs that men lack, including a lumbar (lower back) curve that spans three instead of two vertebrae and spinal joints that are 14 percent larger and positioned differently. These enhancements allow expectant mothers to lean back by as much as 28 degrees more than normal to offset the added heft of a baby bump—up to 30 pounds on average, or the weight of two bowling balls—without destroying their backs, the investigators report in Nature. They also present evidence for similar differences between the sexes in Australopithecines (early relatives of humans), suggesting that women long ago evolved such scaffolding to compensate for walking upright while supporting their swelling wombs. (Nature)http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=news-bytes-why-pregnant-women-dont-tip
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v450/n7172/full/nature06342.html
Damn evolution is freaking amazing…
Posted Environment, Global Warming, Science on Saturday, June 2nd, 2007. Comments(0)
This just in: Dateline May 17, 2007 – More scary crap about stuff melting. Satellite data collected by the scientists between July 1999 and July 2005 showed clear signs that melting had occurred in multiple distinct regions, including far inland and at high latitudes and elevations, where melt had been considered unlikely.
"Antarctica has shown little to no warming in the recent past, with the exception of the Antarctic Peninsula," said Konrad Steffen of the University of Colorado, Boulder. "But now large regions are showing the first signs of the impacts of warming as interpreted by this satellite analysis."
This story is apparently serious enough that even Fox News covered it. Now that’s saying something. This whole "global warming theory" might be something to keep an eye on.
Coming soon To An Antarctic Penguin Near You!
*Image courtesy of visualparadox.com
Posted Environment, Global Warming, Science on Saturday, June 2nd, 2007. Comments(0)
I don’t care if you believe global warming is caused by humans, sun spots, or fruit bats; but you gotta admit that’s a pretty freakin scary headline. Quotes from the article:
"Global warming is accelerating three times more quickly than feared, a series of startling, authoritative studies has revealed. They have found that emissions of carbon dioxide have been rising at thrice the rate in the 1990s. The Arctic ice cap is melting three times as fast – and the seas are rising twice as rapidly – as had been predicted."
AND
"The significance is that this is much faster than even the highest scenario outlined in this year’s massive reports by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) – and suggests that their dire forecasts of devastating harvests, dwindling water supplies, melting ice and loss of species are likely to be understating the threat facing the world."
AND
"On the ground, a study by the University of California’s National Snow and Ice Data Center shows that Arctic ice has declined by 7.8 per cent a decade over the past 50 years, compared with an average estimate by IPCC computer models of 2.5 per cent."
http://environment.independent.co.uk/climate_change/article2609305.ece Seriously, regardless of what you think is causing global warming, you gotta admit that this is some pretty serious stuff.