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Continue reading BoobQuake: the Video Game →

A National Academies report Thursday warned of a crummy economic future unless fixes are made to U.S. science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) education.

Included below are longer reactions to the “Rising Above the Gathering Storm,” report:

here

After all, the distance between the bits my coffee cup is made of and the distance between the bits the coffee table is made of is absolutely hugemoungous. If you were a person standing on one atom of my coffee cup, scaled so the atom was the size of, say a Sofa, and you looked out in the direction of the next atom, it would look like a distant star. Or something.

Perhaps there is some kind of force working, I dunno.

Anyway, this is the kind of question that arises when you look at this thing. Teachers, you can use this to freak out your students!

Stagnant scientific education imperils U.S. economic leadership, says a report by leading business and science figures.

Released Thursday at a congressional briefing attended by senators and Congress members of both parties, the report updates a 2005 science education report that led to moves to double federal research funding.

source

Tonight’s skeptically speaking will be on Improbable Research:

Marc Abrahams

We look at the stranger side of science with Marc Abrahams, the editor of Annals of Improbable Research and creator of the the Ig Nobel Prize. Is science that makes us laugh better at making us think?

and

Speaking up
Neurobiologist Dr. Richard Wassersug explains his research into the relative tastiness of Costa Rican tadpoles.

Details here.

And, don’t forget to listen to the podcast from last week:

Bad Research

Cognitive psychologist Barbara Drescher joins us to discuss the common mistakes scientists make, and what happens to the science when their research goes wrong.

and

Journalist David Dobbs explains the case against Marc Hauser, a prominent Harvard evolutionary biologist who was recently found guilty of scientific misconduct.

“Everyone needs to understand the basic facts of evolution as well as the essentials of the scientific method… When people are deprived of a scientific approach to reality as a whole, they are robbed of both a full appreciation of the beauty and richness of the natural world and the means to understand the dynamics of change not only in nature but in human society as well.”

-Ardea Skybreak, “The Science of Evolution and the Myth of Creationism”

Continue reading Review: The Science of Evolution and the Myth of Creationism →

The Triassic is old. This book is new. That is a hard to beat combination.
Continue reading Triassic Life on Land →

When I finished reading the sixth book, I turned to Julia, then about 12 years old or so, and said “Oh crap, now we have to wait for the next book to come out” and she said “Welcome to my entire life, Dad!”

Anyway, we all love the movies, and here’s the trailers for the next one:
Continue reading Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1 →

Once again, I have been awarded an Editors’ Choice award on Peter Janiszewski’s Research Blogging Blog. They tell me that this is somewhere between an Academy Award and a Nobel Prize. Thank you thank you thank you. And, I’d like to point out that I share this award with several other excellent bloggers and their blog posts, including those on creativity and mental illness, sports injuries, modernization and dietary issues, and the link between stress and suicide. Click here to see summaries and links to all these wonderful posts!

Yeah, it’s pretty much a joke:
Continue reading Christine O’Donnell on Morality →

A piece by Historyguy Five Three Seven One Six:

Did I mention this was the most boring job in the world? Mind-numbingly, soul-crushingly, stab-yourself-in-the-leg-with-a-pen-to-get-them-to-call-an-ambulance-so-you-can-escape-this-meeting- boring. If she wins this seat, she will spend days in meetings discussing the logistics of textbook acquisition, and politely sitting through hours of public comments from people who think Adam and Eve rode dinosaurs to listen to Jesus preach the Sermon on the Sanctity of Tax Cuts for the Rich. Now, for some reason, she actually likes this kind of educational public policy work, and she’ll do a great job at it. But it’s an absolute shame that some of the most important jobs in this country, the local government jobs that keep our streets safe and clean, and keep our kids in school learning to be good citizens, can be taken over by a highly motivated extremist minority who resort to name calling and deception to maintain their hold on power.

Read the whole thing here.

Storm World: Hurricanes, Politics, and the Battle Over Global Warming I’ve been putting off posting my review of this book until just the right moment. Perhaps that moment is now, with the juxtaposition of a serious storm … hurricane Gustav … arriving in the vicinity of New Orleans and the opening day of the Republican National Convention, since both charismatic hurricanes and not so charismatic politicians play such a large role in the book at hand.
Storm World: Hurricanes, Politics, and the Battle Over Global Warming, by Chris Mooney, is a well written, informative, captivating, and important book exploring this question: Does global warming mean that there have been, or will be, more hurricanes, more hurricanes that hit us, or stronger hurricanes? In other words, is a consequence of global warming a world in which the Gulf and Southeastern States of the US becomes a deadly place, as well as regions such as the Bay of Bengal, and will hurricanes begin to affect regions previously untouched by them, such as the Amazon and Europe?

I strongly recommend this book. Here, I’ll give you the gist of the book, explain why it is important, and pontificate a bit on one particular theme regarding hurricanes and global warming.

Continue reading Storm World by Chris Mooney (Book Review) →

Christien Meindertsma, author of “Pig 05049” looks at the astonishing afterlife of the ordinary pig, parts of which make their way into at least 187 non-pork products, from bullets to artificial hearts.

We seep pigs all the time on the highways. Of course, we live near Iowa.