Daily Archives: October 9, 2009
Linux Calendar, Larry Craig, and Moving On
I just love my Linux “calendar” command. It’s an old Unix trick. *nix (Linux, Unix) systems have these special files on them where dated information is stored, for the user, the system, or just because it’s there. If you have a Linux computer, you have several such files already installed. If you go to a command prompt and type “calendar” (and hit enter) you get, typically, today and tomorrow’s entries by default, which include a bunch of historical entries. To wit:
Continue reading Linux Calendar, Larry Craig, and Moving On
How to teach evolution in the college classroom
An item from the NCSE:
Continue reading How to teach evolution in the college classroom
An Open Letter to Americans Who Are Annoyed at Obama’s Nobel Prize
If you are a right wing Republican conservative Yahoo, this letter is NOT for you. If you are a moderate, progressive, liberal, centrist, or anyone associated with the legitimate (i.e., not FOX News) press, this IS for you.
Continue reading An Open Letter to Americans Who Are Annoyed at Obama’s Nobel Prize
Los Angeles Venue Cancels Intelligent Design Film
You’ll recall that it was recently reported that the Californial Science Center, which is loosely affiliated with the Smithsonian Institution, had planned a screening of “Darwin’s Dilemma: The Mystery of the Cambrian Fossil Record” which is apparently a creationist documentary.
Well, now, the venue has cancelled the showing and the ID people are all lathered up about it.
Continue reading Los Angeles Venue Cancels Intelligent Design Film
The latest on evolution from the Vatican
A recently published statement on current scientific knowledge on cosmic evolution and biological evolution from the Pontifical Academy of Sciences concludes: “The extraordinary progress in our understanding of evolution and the place of man in nature should be shared with everyone. … Furthermore, scientists have a clear responsibility to contribute to the quality of education, especially as regards the subject of evolution.” The statement appears in the proceedings of “Scientific Insights into the Evolution of the Universe and of Life,” a plenary session of the Pontifical Academy of Sciences held from October 31 to November 4, 2008.
Well, that about settles it then…
Continue reading The latest on evolution from the Vatican
New Ring Discovered around Saturn
NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope has discovered a new ring around Saturn. This ring is very different from those previously known. In some ways, this ring resembles the “accretionary disk” found around some stars more than it resembles the thin, orderly rings that Saturn is famous for.
Read about it here.
Tuberculosis Detected in Bones from 9 kya Israeli Neolithic Site
A team of archaeologists working offshore from Haifa, Israel in the Mediterranean has discovered both direct and indirect evidence of human tuberculosis. This is important because, if confirmed, the TB cases date to 3,000 years earlier than expected: The disease should not be in skeletons this old. Also, this research seems to indicate that Tuberculosis did not originally arise in cattle to be later transmitted to humans, but rather, the other way around.
Continue reading Tuberculosis Detected in Bones from 9 kya Israeli Neolithic Site
The LCROSS mission: The video
Massachusetts Bill To Push Creationism Into Schools?
This just in from the NCSE:
Continue reading Massachusetts Bill To Push Creationism Into Schools?
If the moon mission failed
… there was a speech and a plan …
Posted here on Collective Imagination.
Liveblogging the Lunar Impact
The big machines are going to whack into the moon in a few minutes.
They just said “Ten minutes to impact. Fight, are you go?” (go) “Payload, are you go?” (go) “Command, are you go?” (go) “Somebodyelse I can’t remember are you go?” (go).
We are seeing images being beamed back from the moon.
There is a problem with the transmission rate of the data which will force them to make a last minute adjustment of the resolution of some of the images the space craft will be sending back.
A critical instrument has been checked out and it seems to work: This is an instrument that will observe the flash of impact.
The mission is dedicated to Wlater Cronkite, by the way.
FIVE MINUTES to centaur impact, they are showing this ever enlargenting image with a little white arrow onit where the impact is hgoing to happen. This isinterlaced wiht a FC IR image (I think). And, ther is an image of the cenatur craft shot from the LCROSS out ahead of it. And an image of the two dots moving closer and closer to the moon, which looks like an image from earth but it could be from some satellite.
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Getting closer, closer, closer … They’ll be able to put these refreshed GIF’s (which is what they look like now) into a pretty nice youtube video.
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TWO MINUTES
Wait, wait, is that a little vilage of moon people I see there?
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Sixty seconds out … Flash sequence starts. They are changing the NRI to OPR9 … Is that MRI or NRI????? OH crap, November November?… Whas that NRI? To OPR0??
Whatever whatever!!!!
IMACT IMPACT…
We don’t see anything yet. I don’t see anything het. We are getting closer to the crater
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They are making very last second adjustments to sampling rates for the photos. I still don’t see anything and the craft is getting closer and closer to its own impact.
I see no plume. Isn’t there supposed to be a pllume?
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Wow, I don’t think it worked. We are about to hit themoon and there is no plume. Noting looks different…
Oh holy crap, the signal just disappeared and everyone is freaking out!
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True panic as the visulal is lost and they are having trouble communicating.
Only IR signal availbe and it is not too good.
Imact is about to happen, iI see the surface.
They are getting a thermal signature.
I think it’s hit, LOS (impact) the second aircraft hit the moon,.
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This is a bit different than other missions because there is not that ambiguity about whether or not they can keep the intrumetns working a little longer, collect a littele more data, etc…All the instruments are mushed!
The mission analysits all look really worried I think something did screw up big time at the end. They are already starting to develop their excuses…
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They are replaying the mission and discussing it but the scientists have all gone silent to do their jobs. There will be no new information for a couple of hours probably.