Is Rick Perry the New Bachmann? There is a distinct possibility that this is true.
Sarah Posner, author of God’s Profits: Faith, Fraud, and the Republican Crusade for Values Voters
In last night’s debate, Rick Perry, stumbling over his answer denying the science of climate change, opined, “Galileo got outvoted for a spell.” Of course Galileo, considered the father of modern science, wasn’t “outvoted” by other scientists, he was subjected to an inquisition by the church for being a heretic.
One final Back To School item. Do you think students should be required to recite the Pledge of Allegiance in US Public Schools every day? Increasingly, this is being required. Here are a number of reasons to NOT allow this, and a suggestion as to what to do about it: Demand that the Pledge of Allegiance Not Be Recited in Your Local School.
It is the first or second week of class in most US schools, and this is when students, parents, and teachers find out what’s new. One of the things being added in schools around the country this year, as has been the case several years running, is the requirement that the Pledge of Allegiance be recited in class every morning, or in some cases, weekly. You can work against letting this happen in your local school.
Continue reading Demand that the Pledge of Allegiance Not Be Recited in Your Local School
Let’s begin with Tropical Storm Lee. There is actually quite a bit left of this no-longer named low pressure system, and it is sitting over the northern part of the East Coast producing a fair amount of rain. “So what?” you say! Good question. The thing is, that a hurricane in the Atlantic by the name of Katia (accent on the first syllable, long ‘a’, hard k, rhymes with onomatopoeia) is probably gong to restrain this low pressure to the region of the continent instead of letting it waft off into the North Atlantic. Likely, Katia will push ex-Lee west. So, the Eastern Great Lakes and the Ohio Valley can expect mondo rain, and that system will then have the opportunity to pass east again. The reason I mention this in a post about hurricanes is that the whole scenario is a tropical weather pattern and it is more important than average given the amount of rain that as fallen in the region this season. Unfortunately, this will not help Texas and Northern Minnesota which have apparently caught fire.
And, speaking of Katia …
Continue reading There are interesting things going on in the Atlantic Basin, hurricane-wise
The republican party has become increasingly corrupted at the activist level by a mix of antiscience religious zealots and anti-climate change contrarian irrationalists. This is causing problems for candidates who need to make it through the endorsing process while still appearing rational enough to win the general election. The GOP Reagan Library Debate had this tap dancing on ready display, and highlights the problem reason-minded republicans face.
A recent TED talk
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iYwAMccbhYs&w=425&h=269]
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SUBJECT: BOSNIA: MICROSOFT AND PM SPIRIC SIGN STRATEGIC
PARTNERSHIP AGREEMENTREF: SARAJEVO 1351
¶1. On December 18, the BiH Council of Ministers and Microsoft finally signed a Strategic Partnership Agreement for access to legal Microsoft applications for all state-level government ministries. Prime Minister Nikola Spiric signed
the agreement on behalf of the BiH Government. The agreement
obligates the BiH Government to use licensed software, but is
only the first step in strengthening the state government’s
intellectual property regime. Microsoft will now begin
negotiations with BiH to purchase licenses for the software
applications under the state’s purview. This marks a huge success for the U.S. Embassy, which has been working with state-level officials for three years to push for action to ban pirated and unlicensed software from ministry offices.
(Note: Federation and RS-entity governments signed separate
strategic partnership agreements with Microsoft in 2006. End
note.)
ENGLISH
Fox News has just come out with a new poll that shows that 77% of Americans believe that prayers “literally help someone heal from an injury or illness” and 15% think Darwinand other scientists are right about evolution and creationists are wrong (but 26% believe that both are correct). The poll has a sampling error of about 3% and appears to have been conducted correctly.
Could someone please tell me why this is interesting?
I like to pass books about science on to the teachers in my daughter’s school for them to have in the classroom (or to pass on to the library, as they wish). Now that you’ve heard this idea, you will want to do it to!
Here’s a few suggestions of recent titles that could be available used or cheap.
Continue reading Life Science and Earth Science Teachers: A few books for your classroom
I will surely write something about 9/11 on 9/11, but in the mean time I thought I’d repost something I wrote some time ago about how things changed after the WTC towers collapsed. In the post reproduced before, I’m saying essentially what is being said here. I won’t bother mentioning that I said it many years ago, that would be obnoxious. The original post was titled 911 Reverberates in Boston.
A few essays. You are not alone. These are previously posted items, just follow the links to read them in their entirety.
Continue reading In support of biology teachers …
This is the claim being made:
Oh, I can’t believe she’s never going camping again because she saw an alligator! Personally, I like running across this sort of animal.
I hope there is an actual scientific investigation of this. I’d love to know if this creature could possibly have wintered over. This is a rather large beast to haven not been in the wild for about a year, though I suppose it is possible that someone fed it up in their basement.
Here are a few books that those in the education biz should have on hand. If you are a parent with a kid in school, consider giving a copy of one or more of these books to your school’s life science teacher and a key administrator or two.
Continue reading Back to school: Books for teachers and administrators
The Duluth News Tribune is supposed to be the number one newspaper in the Northlands of Minnesota. Or at least, that is what they say. Over 4 million people visited their web site in August 2011. That’s a lot of visits. Earlier today, the Duluth News Tribune, ironically (go look up “Tribune”) posted a letter to the editor chastising an earlier run piece from the Washington Post that confused Presidential Candidate Rick Perry’s belief in creationism with a belief in “Young Earth Creationism.”
The letter written by Dan Erickson says:
Continue reading Duluth News Tribune: Seriously?