Pharyngula: The hopeless inanity of Egnor

Pharyngula: The hopeless inanity of Egnor:
"I told him that I never criticize his religion in the classroom, nor do I push atheism. Instead, it's like this: what he does with his religion is the equivalent of telling his kids that the sky is green, and worse, assuring them that this is a fundamental tenet of their religion and that the whole structure comes crashing down if they question it. They get in my classroom, and I don't tell them their religion is wrong — I tell them to open their eyes and look up.*"

I generally favor the idea of teaching comparative religion…

Category: Religion

Posted on: March 29, 2008 10:41 PM, by PZ Myers

but there is a good argument against it: many religions are sickening.

Pharyngula: The simple falsehood at the heart of Expelled

Pharyngula: The simple falsehood at the heart of Expelled:

"Darwin realized that the environment has consequences and can shape the generation-by-generation passage of hereditary traits in populations, and that examination of the natural world reveals that it has been doing exactly that. He realized that ubiquitous forces that are so simple we take them for granted have been quietly and slowly sculpting our heredity since the beginning of life on earth."

Seed: Clarke's Magic

Seed: Clarke's Magic: "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."

'Biology prof expelled from screening of 'Expelled'' by Chris Hewitt, TwinCities.com - RichardDawkins.net

'Biology prof expelled from screening of 'Expelled'' by Chris Hewitt, TwinCities.com - RichardDawkins.net: "It's almost too perfect: P.Z. Myers tried to see the movie, 'Expelled,' at the Mall of America Thursday.

But he was expelled."

It just gets funnier and funnier...

Pharyngula: EXPELLED!

Pharyngula: EXPELLED!: "a rich, deep kind of irony that must be shared"

Oh Thor this is funny! The producers of Expelled are such losers. So stupid. Amazing. And pathetic.

NPR: In a Jerusalem Suburb, Jewish Cultures Clash

NPR: In a Jerusalem Suburb, Jewish Cultures Clash

I can't wait until the Christians and Muslim here in the US start telling people how to dress and think... It is happening in Europe with immigrant Muslims and there is too much accomodation going on.

The big misunderstanding about respect... that I should respect anyone's religion or beliefs. I should respect the people around me, at least until they prove otherwise. But I do not have to respect anyone's religion. There are not any religious rights other than your right to practice a religion. The religion itself has no rights. It cannot say to a community that women have to cover up in order to keep from distracting men from their religious thoughts. How stupid. Their religion is too feeble to keep men's attention focused? Very feeble excuse for mind control.

Five myths about the satellite smash-up - Space- msnbc.com

Five myths about the satellite smash-up - Space- msnbc.com

Good article.

Satellite Shot Down

Good Shot! Go Navy!
Some good explainations from the BadAstronomy guy


But I doubt the US was concerned about technology getting to the ground. I think it really was about the hydrazine. I bet NRO has specs to ensure the classified aspects of their projects burn up properly on reentry. Like he says, these NRO projects reenter all the time, usually on command and into known places, but NRO isn't going to take the chance that a reentry will go wrong and plop a classified payload in China. So, I bet there was no concern, as was stated, that classified tech would be found.

The below video shows how the debris spreads. A misconception people have is that the missle shot the satellite. Actually it is more like the missle was run over by the satellite. The NRO satellite is traveling in orbit around the earth at 17000mph, the missle isn't going nearyly that fast. This is more like driving my Jetta onto the tracks just in front of a Japanese Bullet Train at full speed. The speed of the collision at 17000mph is what destroyed everything. The resulting debris continues on in mostly the same orbit the NRO satellite was traveling in, mostly unchanged. Now each piece is smaller and affected by the earth's atmosphere more than the whole was. Pieces have been slowed and thus dip lower into the atmosphere. Any fragments headed upward will be turned around by the earth's gravity and come back down, again dipping lower into the atmosphere and burning in. As the video shows, when the parts get low enough, they really start to slow down due to air friction and fall to the earth. But not all at once, it will take days for it all to come down.

New Toy for the plane

From New airplane toy

I am so happy. I know what is going on with all six cylinders!

Spaceflight Now | Breaking News | U.S. plans to fire missile at falling spy satellite

Spaceflight Now Breaking News U.S. plans to fire missile at falling spy satellite

"Solid as it is now, not all of it will melt, OK?" he said. "So you will land on the ground with a tank full of slush hydrazine that would then later evaporate. The tank will have been breached. Not probably, the tank will have been breached because the fuel lines will have been ripped out of the main spacecraft and so that hydrazine will vent."

Pharyngula: Unbelievable

Pharyngula: Unbelievable

Happy Valentine's day...

"Saudi Arabia is one screwed up, vile little backwater of a barbarous craphole. You have to read the case of Fawza Falih. She has been condemned to death. By beheading...

And the crime for which she is to be executed? Witchcraft. She is accused of casting a spell that caused a man to become impotent, and threatening to cause people to be possessed by dogs.

Apparently, the spells must have worked all too well, since all the men of Saudi Arabia are now cowardly eunuchs with the souls of craven mongrels. At least, that's the only explanation I can see for their uncivilized behavior."

I have NO respect for ANY religious beliefs. Shit.

Darwin Day Celebration

Darwin Day Celebration

Happy birthday Charles Darwin! And Abe Lincoln as well.



199 years ago!

Pharyngula: Our congress takes care of the IMPORTANT stuff

Pharyngula: Our congress takes care of the IMPORTANT stuff:

"Responding to complaints from the Religious Right, Congress has passed
legislation mandating that the phrase "In God We Trust" be moved from the edge
to the back or front of the new presidential dollar coins."

"They're all demented fuckwits."

They snuck that one in on us.

Health Care: OneCareNow Video

YouTube - OneCareNow Video

A short video on the California Health Care plan being pushed through the California legislature...



Now that Arnold's sell out to the insurance companies is dead, distractions from SB840 for California single payer health care is removed.

SB840:
* Health care is paid by California to private doctors and health care providers at rates they negotiate. It is still free market, the doctors don't work for California.
* California negotiates prices with equipment providers, pharma, doctors, hospitals, potentially leading to great savings with the un-ignorable buying power we will have.
* You and your doctor decide what care you need, California only pays the bill.
* You pay a 2% insurance premium, your employer pays 8%, with 30million Californians spreading the risk, the rates stay low. (Is it a "tax"? Get over it, we have to pay for it somehow, isn't it better to be efficient about it?)
* No co-pay, no deductibles, no pre-existing condition exceptions.
* Every resident is covered. (Get over the illegal alien thing, if they pay, they get covered, you are paying for them today when they go into an emergency room for treatment without insurance or money)
* Medicare has 3% administrative overhead. Current insurance industry has 30% "administrative" overhead which includes all the ads you see, profit for shareholders, salaries for executives, and lobby money to your representatives (like old Arnold and Hillary). That $30 billion wasted is enough to pay for all of our health care.

It seems to me that a lot of economic prosperity is stifled by the inability of employers to get employees, to keep them healthy, for people to spend on stuff instead of insurance premiums and going into debt over health bills. There are concerns about availability of services once everyone has coverage. That may be initially the case as far as I can tell. But it isn't Canada where the doctors are government employees. If the market is there and they are getting paid, then they will come.

Write your State Rep and express your support.

For more info: http://onecarenow.org

Tom