This SchadenFriday goes out to.... me, and my massive life changes. Take it away, Glen. Someone's in the backyard banging on the door Daddy's gone away, he's coming back no more His baby's curled up on a stranger's floor Momma's thinking family dinners weren't too much to ask for Everybody here's got a story to tell Everybody's been through their own hell There's nothing too special about getting hurt But getting over it, that takes the work One way or the other we'll all need each other Nothing's gonna turn out the way you thought it would Friends and lovers, don't you duck and cover Cause…

The Alliance for Science, in an effort to further dialogue between the science, religious,and business communities, is committed to bringing in a diverse network of speakers to its public meetings in the DC Metro area. Last year we had Dr. Peter Folger from the American Geophysical Union, Reverend Henry Green, ScienceBlog's own Chris Mooney, NCSE's Eugenie Scott, and AfS co-chair Paul Forbes to name a few. Now we're looking to a whole new year of fun with evolution education (yes, we're on an academic calendar...). Next Thursday, October 12th, is speaker Michael Shermer. He will also have…

On the heels of an earlier paper review comes another journal submission. This one was substantially worse than the other paper; the last was overall pretty good but came with some obvious inadequacies of choice. Not so with this one, and I was forced to reject it outright. Hopefully I can help people with their future submissions by supplying a few more tips. If English is not your first language, and you are publishing in an English language journal, get the best translating service possible given your budget. If you an afford to pay, pay. If not, have multiple bilinguals assist you…

The takedown intro has been posted at The Panda's Thumb. If the server's down, keep checking in. Over the next week or two, various bloggers will pick apart the different chapters and expose this trash for what it is; a coffee table book for the sycophantic zombies among us. While I predict it will have a very limited audience, that audience consists primarily of so-called "family values" politicians who will buy into this vapid PR campaign. Yours truly will pick a Chapter apart midway through next week, so check back here around Wednesday. In the meantime, Tara has already trashed one…

Without a doubt, Senator George Allen's gift that keeps on giving. Looking over Mr. Sidarth's numbers in the article, I see further proof that we monkeys are destined to reclaim the planet from you lowly H. sapiens.

Peer-reviewing a submitted article can be an interesting process. On one hand, you get a chance to glimpse the latest findings in the field before they even become public (outside of the data appearing in an abstract or on a conference poster). There is also the challenge of putting your mind to the grindstone; a reviewer has to stay sharp and think around corners, pick out where fuzzy language might be masking a methodological problem, or find points of contention in the data that the authors missed. Yet he or she must also remain both tough and fair, so that when and if a paper is…

As I posted Saturday, I'm on a quest to get myself back into tip-top physical condition for my upcoming Thai boxing test. To do this I need to set goals for myself. I'm going to enlist the help of my readers on this one! Warning: half-nekkid monkeys ahead I made a deal with myself-- I can get a new pair of kick-ass running shoes, IFF I can get a six-pack going. I figure this goal will take another month to six weeks to reach. I'm posting a picture of myself now for reference and will keep posting more pictures periodically, every 2-3 weeks. I'll try to rig polls as we go so all 5 of…

Looks like yet another interesting toxin was found, this time in a venomous snail. This discovery comes from the lab of an old player in the field, who apparently discovered the conotoxin that is used in Prialt. McIntosh says the OmIA toxin will be useful in designing new medicines because it fits like a key into certain lock-like "nicotinic acetylcholine receptors" found on nerve cells in the brain and the rest of the nervous system. "Those are the same types of receptors you activate if you smoke a cigarette," he says, explaining that nicotine in cigarette smoke "binds" to the receptor to…

Another interesting twist in my life is at the gym. It turns out that Kru Scott is sufficiently satisfied with my progress and prior exposure that he's going to let me skip the Level I test and go straight to Level II. This means I get to cut at least a full year off my training time! Likely I will be able to test for my Muay Thai Assistant Instructor certification in the next year to year and a half. That is freakin' awesome. What is not freakin' awesome is the physical condition I'll have to be in for the test, which will likely occur in November. I've got about 3 months to get in the…

Today is the One Year Anniversary of my Ph.D. The last couple weeks I've had what I thought might be Frodo-like anxiety aftereffects, and was briefly concerned that I might also have been pierced by a Morgul blade, bitten by a giant spider, and have Phantom Limb from where my finger was bitten off by an ugly CGI character. But I realized no, that wasn't the case (whew), any anxiety I've experienced (and my concomitant hiatus) is due to 1. my postdoctoral NRSA proposal 2. my hard drive crashing and the big number 3...... ... Evil Monkey is back in the monkey business!!! I submitted an…

Your results:You are Spider-Man Spider-Man 95% Hulk 85% Superman 80% Green Lantern 80% The Flash 75% Iron Man 60% Supergirl 58% Robin 58% Batman 55% Catwoman 55% Wonder Woman 48% You are intelligent, witty, a bit geeky and have great power and responsibility. Click here to take the Superhero Personality Quiz

As every Evil Monkey knows, you've bestowed upon a student from UVA a great honor. S.R. Sidarth, a senior at the University of Virginia, had been trailing Allen with a video camera to document his travels and speeches for the Webb campaign. During a campaign speech Friday in Breaks, Virginia, near the Kentucky border, Allen singled out Sidarth and called him a word that sounded like "Macaca." "This fellow here over here with the yellow shirt, Macaca, or whatever his name is. He's with my opponent. He's following us around everywhere. And it's just great. We're going to places all over…

I'm taking a bit of a hiatus for a few days. This week has been absolutely bonkers, plus my hard drive died on me. I'll try to post some life updates and then get back to science bloggin'!

Getting back in shape is harder with age! While I've been having good luck at my gym lately, becoming proficient at the finer points of slipping, bobbing and weaving, my stamina isn't what it used to be. Ergo I've spent a lot of time running hills and let's just say in this weather, it ain't a cake walk. My normal run is just under 3 miles, but the first mile is almost completely uphill. I've been timing myself on the first mile and I *just* missed my best time on it last Wednesday, (coming in at 7:39, 5 seconds over my best) which was the hottest day this year so far (104, 115 heat index…

Welcome to the 4th edition of The Synapse, a blog carnival for all things mind and brain held every two weeks. A little shorter than normal this round, due to the fact that there's a grant deadline tomorrow and a lot of regulars are busy busy little monkeys, self included. The neurophilosopher presents Artificial animals controlled by a "brain" in a culture dish posted at The neurophilosopher. Nifty pics of rat cortical neurons grown on an electrode array are included. Mind Hacks brings us a poignant topic, the Neuropsychology of combat and chemical warfare where the effects of chronic…

I've been thinking about other science-type flicks, and for 2nd place I'd like to suggest a couple more: Gattaca, yes for sure. Wonderful dystopian flick. Absolutely beautiful to watch, a soaring overly melodramatic soundtrack. Crystal clear message about statistical vs individual outcomes, and the power of the human will in a genetically biased world. If you haven't seen it then you need to. The next nomination, Sleepy Hollow. This is, in my mind, Tim Burton's best flick. Johnny Depp does a wonderful job of taking on the role of bumbling citydwelling Constable Ichabod Crane, sent to…

I'm stuck today between gloating over the losses for radical anti-science conservative school board members in Kansas primary elections, and Bill Dembski's research assistant Joel Borofsky admitting that the Kansas science standards are a stealth attempt to teach ID and not about "teaching the (false) controversy". Congrats on another successful round, guys. Have fun spinning this as a win. I'll be at the pool, reading over my grant proposal for the research you're not doing. Ta ta.

The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities notes that the House of Representatives is planning on implementing legislative martial law tomorrow. What, exactly, is this procedure? The House leadership is using a parliamentary gambit to evade a longstanding House rule that is supposed to ensure that this kind of obfuscation does not occur. That House rule (Rule XIII(6)(a)) provides that a resolution (called a rule) reported by the Rules Committee cannot be considered by the House on the same legislative day that the rule is reported (except by a two-thirds vote of the House). This is supposed…

Oh well. At least she has good taste in movies. In the meantime, I'll file this under "H" for "scooped". SEED asks us What movie do you think does something admirable (though not necessarily accurate) regarding science? Real Genius takes the cake. I must have seen that movie 10 times when it came out (back when movies were $2.50). When college rolled around, I could totally relate-- there was way too much brain power in our suite of 8 and our social circle; granted we had a number of people rotate in and out, but the 201/2F tradition spawned numerous physicians, at least 2 Ph.D.s, a CPA,…

.... will be hosted here. Make sure you get your submissions to me by Saturday night. The cutoff is 11:59pm.