Open Thread

*ahem*

Sorry, something in my throat.

Anyone interested in SEEING Gore's powerful speech rather than reading it should go to http://www.c-span.org/ and then go down to the middle of the page to Audio/Video and click on the Gore speech. If this guy had spoken like this when running for office he would have been president. Gone is the boring, plodding, professorial (sorry Myers) Gore of 5 years ago! Back then, when he was being passionate, it looked like he was "trying". This was from the guts. Whoever handled his campaign back then should resign from the Democratic Party. Clearly, Gore had it in him, but his people didn't let him loose!

Feminists noted and added to the long list.

I have no problem with bible classes in public schools, as long as they're teaching about religion, and not teaching religion. I'd rather see comparative religion, too, but heck, educating some of these people about what's actually in the Bible seems like a fine idea, since a lot of public figures who use it as their basis of authority don't seem to have actually read it.

Since it's an open thread ---

It's Science Fair time again. My 1st and 3rd graders want to work together on a biology experiment with animals. Any thoughts on something age appropriate? Are there any easy evolution experiments that they could do?

I'm extremely skeptical of the ability of the average believing teacher to teach about the Bible without confessional stances coming into play. The choice of text itself is confessional. Is it the Jewish Bible (different organization, no Jesus stuff)? Is it the Catholic Bible (different organization, Jesus stuff, deuterocanonical books, imprimatur)? Is it the Eastern Orthodox Bible (as Catholic, a few extra Psalms)? Is it the canon of the Ethiopian church (includes Sheperd of Hermas and several other additional works)? Is any textual criticism going to be referenced? Are issues such as the naked henoheism of much of the Hebrew Bible going to be treated seriously, or will apologetic be shat all over the class?

Teaching about the Bible sounds fine, until you realize that it's never going to happen in a high school without titanic loads of secterian baggage...which of course raises the usual Establishment Clause concerns. Comparative religion classes have the same problem as soon as the Christian teacher hits the unit on Christianity. Or the Jewish teacher on Judaism, etc.

Thanks for the link, Peez!

I've got a bottle of that Black Cherry Vanilla Coke rat cheer, and I'm giving it a thumbs-down. Bit of a Brach's Candy-Corn thing going on. Makes me want to brush my teeth. OTOH, I am all pitter-pat for the Lime variation they sell. That's my tipple these days.

Idle Question:

Was the Dover decision an Atomic Wedgie for the ID crowd?

I bought some of that Black Cherry Vanilla Coke on accident the other day (I think the packaging is almost exactly the same as regular coke), and I didn't like it at all. I'll stick with Coke Zero!

Eh, FYI, the front page line-spacing is a bit gappy. Looks like 12 on 24 pt? This is on Firefox 1.0.1 on OSX 10.3.9.

Oh good, I've got an irrelevant rant, which is sort of tangential off Jeff Shallitt's "Blowhard" entry at Recursivity last week. In comments there, several people bemoaned the current status of our local daily, the Ottawa Citizen, as a lowest common denominator conservative quasi-religious rag.

I don't get the Citizen (for reasons stated above), but I happened to peruse a copy yesterday in the waiting room of a car repair shop. The first Letter To The Editor was a reply to an editorial which apparently had said something favorable about gay marriage on the grounds that you can't legislate morality (something like that -- having not read the original editorial, I'm gleaning this from reading between the lines of the reply).

First the writer starts off complaining about the "liberal editorial board" of the paper. Um....if this wing-nut thinks the Citizen is a liberal paper, then he's so far over the horizon in right field, he can't even see the centre any more.

Next he claims that the majority of Canadians are against gay marriage (could be, I haven't been watching the polls), and that the majority indeed does have the right to legislate their morality on others. Apparently, he is unfamiliar with (or approves of) the concept of "tyranny of the majority". I'd like to ask him: if the majority decided that Jews (or just maybe, Fundamentalists) were immoral and should be shipped off to internment camps, would that be OK with him?

He goes on to claim that the reaction of disgust felt by many people at the idea of gay sex is simply a proper reaction to an unnatural act. Is he not aware that racists express the same revulsion at the idea of interracial marriage? And similarly claim that it is "unnatural"? It's not often one sees the Argument From Personal Revulsion stated so explicitly. It takes considerable hubris to insist that one's personal aversions have the status of universal moral law, and most bigots instinctively make some attempt to camouflage that that's what they're doing. But hey, there's a number of alleged "foods" I wouldn't mind banning on the grounds that they turn my sensitive stomach.....

But now for the kicker: I used to know this wing-nut. Haven't seen him at all for maybe 13 years, but we saw each a fair bit, back in my fundamentalist days. Last I heard through the grapevine, he was self-publishing a book with his own timetable for the Second Coming (!). Geez, the company I used to keep....

Science!!!

PZ channels Thomas Dolby, yo!

I've never understood the fascination that some have for Gore. Much like Dubya, he's a son of a politician and has been groomed for the role of president like a son of a medieval lord -- exactly the sort of person I wouldn't want in the role of president. While he no doubt would have been better than Dubya, that isn't saying much, and he's yesterday's news anyway. What's next? Speeches by Walter Mondale? Or Michael Dukakis? And what was so great about Gore's speech anyhow? He said wiretapping was bad and Dubya was unethical? As if every non-Republican isn't already convinced on those points already. I hope the Democratic Party isn't so desperate for candidates that it's planning on recycling Gore

Would it be possible for the people at Seed to make it so I only need to log in once to comment on any of the blogs? Just wondering, DS

Since this is an open thread, here's something specfically political:

Reagan Navy Secretary (& former Marine) James Webb weighs in on the sliming of politicians who are also veterans, and it ain't pretty for the folks in the Oval Office.

Was the Dover decision an Atomic Wedgie for the ID crowd?

I think it's clear the judge wanted it to be so.

I know, I know, Davison's an easy target...

This is a very minor suggestion, but as a Morris alumni it pains my heart to see the UMM logo buried so far down on that left column. Any way to make it a little more prominent, without making it seem like Pharyngula is affiliated with Morris (even though the Morris officials are supportive of it)?

Aar, Piracy in West Virginia! And it be landlocked, too.

Our ears once breathed

Fossil evidence points to origin of hearing apparatus.

Our ears could have started evolutionary life as a tube for breathing, say scientists, after examining the ancestral structure in a 370-million-year-old fossil fish.
...
The researchers examined Panderichthys and found that the bony structures in its head combine features of fish and tetrapods, capturing a snapshot of evolution in action. "It's neat to see that transition," says Hans Thewissen who studies the evolution of the ear and other organs at Northeastern Ohio Universities College of Medicine, Rootstown.
...

Wow - I had no idea Van Gooch was teaching at UMM! Cool.

"Science!!!

PZ channels Thomas Dolby, yo!"

Either that, or TMBG:

YYYYES!
I will date the girl from Venus!
Flowers die and so will I!
Yes I will kiss the girl from Venus...
For Science!!!

Seems to me PZ is PRECISELY the sort to be a Venusian love-slave who's preparing missiles to destroy the universe...I'm sure squid figure into that somehwere... ;)

27 previously unidentified species found in California cave
It sounds like most of them are arthropods.

"Caves are like little laboratories of evolution," said entomologist Steve Heydon, collection manager for the Bohart Museum of Entomology. "What happens inside the isolation of a cave shows how bodies of animals can be transformed."

Have a little rant going at my movie blog over the fundies going berserk over the Golden Globe win for Brokeback Mountain, and the dishonesty they're spouting about that film's performance. ID isn't the only thing these losers lie about.

womp womp

We read parts of the Bible in my high school English class. The purpose of this was in part that the Bible is an important piece of literature regardless of your beliefs, but also so that we could better understand Biblical allusions made in the classical literature we were studying. There is more than ample reason to study the Bible for strictly scholarly reasons, and it shouldn't be a problem to do so in a high school class, or any class for that matter. By the way, I should also mention, although years later I learned that my teacher was a Christian, he in no way prosletized or even stated his beliefs.

The researchers examined Panderichthys and found that the bony structures in its head combine features of fish and tetrapods, capturing a snapshot of evolution in action. "It's neat to see that transition," says Hans Thewissen who studies the evolution of the ear and other organs

No, no, no, no. Haven't you heard? Absolutely no transitional fossils have ever been found. I mean, every day or two some new guy appears at PT and starts saying that, it must be true...

How about an evolution beer:

http://www.wasatchbeers.com/

I'm all for teaching the Bible in high school as long as Asimov's Guide to the Bible is the textbook.
As for a middle column, Noooooooooo! No page with three columns works with my Firefox browser, which is the browser all reality based people should be using. Internet Explorer is a living fossil. This page as it is now looks great and should not be messed with.

Um, John Thomas, how can that be? Try mine; it's three-column, and I have no trouble using it or any other 3-column page with Firefox.

Our ears could have started evolutionary life as a tube for breathing, say scientists, after examining the ancestral structure in a 370-million-year-old fossil fish.

Last year a very drunken friend said to me, "I've read C.S.Lewis, I've read Thomas Aquinas, but the workings of the inner ear are the best evidence I've seen for the existence of God"...(brief reflection) "...and I'm pretty sure that ear wax is the Devil."

Along with Asimov's Guide, I would add Mark Twain's Letters From the Earth. Pretty good analysis of Adam & Eve and the Noah situation. And heaven. Though that might ruffle a few school board members a wee bit.

The Serpent and the Rainbow.

I bought this book for my gf (along with a copy of Richard Dawkin's the Acncestor's Tale, and an awesome Gaming mouse for her fragging pleasure - Logitech G7 cordless laser) over the holidays, and we just finished watching the movie, where at the end, they say that tetrodotoxin actually CAN create a zombie! (well, sorta...) =) Puffer fish poison is fascinating!

HA! Architeuthix dux ISN'T the only interesting critter down there you know!

But that lead me to read about some other crazy stuff: palytoxin ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palytoxin ). This stuff can kill you so fast and so undetectably that absent someone who knows EXACTLY what to look for, you would be pronounced dead of heart failure in seconds (assuming you got enough of it on you!).

It would be cool if you wrote us an article about the weird and deadly poisons down there (and how the heck multiple species evolved the SAME compound! HA! Let your precious "theory" of evolution explain that!).

The way is works is crazy too, but I can't wrap it quite around my head because I dunno enough biology!

Anyway, here's what I know:

It blocks the pores in the nerve that release a chemical that is required in neural signalling (blocking what? the ability for the nerve to produce voltage? I need a drawing or something )?, thereby paralyzing the victim...but does not cross the blood brain barrier (?) so the victim is perfectly conscious and knows exactly what is happening to them (BEING BURIED ALIVE)... Of course, any dose larger than 4 milligrams is deadly (can you been see 4 milligrams with the naked eye?) so the moral is, don't get this stuff on you!

I also know that apparently it's quite common and you can find it inside the tanks of reef aquarists everyehere! (Holy Toledo!)

Ok, so if you decide to put up an article, I need the straight dope on this, wikipedia says EXTREME CAUTION.

This: http://reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?s=eba7ef2398e8b3b5277dbb55…
Says EXTREME CAUTION and then they get skeptical and decide not to believe it too hard because of a lot of anecdotal evidence that many of them have had it for years and never been killed (Zoanthids, a coral) :) by it ... (but I'm not done reading).

I believe Wikipedia...for now.

Federico Contreras
Curious Layman

PS: Also, using this poison, a voodoo priest can capture your soul and stick it inside a little pot (beat that one Mr Smartypantz!).

--------------
I wrote PZ to figure this out, but he's too busy and I need to know...

Or my head is gonna 'splode!

It would be cool if you wrote us an article about the weird and deadly poisons down there (and how the heck multiple species evolved the SAME compound! HA! Let your precious "theory" of evolution explain that!).

tetrodotoxin is produced by a symbiotic microbe. it's not the case that several species evolved it independently; there were several independent acquisitions of a useful mutualism.

djlactin, y0u are the ultimate suck. Why don't you just whet my appetite and then leave me there to hang, go ahead, I dont mind.

Linkmeister sez:
Um, John Thomas, how can that be? Try mine; it's three-column, and I have no trouble using it or any other 3-column page with Firefox.

On my browser your column 3 crowds column 2 to the point of deleting 1 - 3 letters from the last word of each line. This is better than the NY Times' expansion well beyond the parameters of the screen but still not good enough. I'm using Firefox 1.5 for Macintosh; you may be using another version.

Well, yeah, FF 1.07 for XP, but still. I haven't heard any one of my Mac-using readers say anything. How very odd.

Anonymous: actually, the mutualism hypothesis less certain than i thought, but the story is much more interesting....

http://dhushara.freehosting.net/book/upd/jun01/20101/tetro.htm

If you go to see the Prairie Hos, you will ask what's happening to their lawsuit, please?

Linkmeister says:

On my browser your column 3 crowds column 2 to the point of deleting 1 - 3 letters from the last word of each line.

Just widen the window; you're hitting the minimum width. Which is too wide, in my opinion (and really, the column with, y'know, content ought not to be clobbered by the navigation columns). But it works, reflowing the text and all, if you keep the window wide enough. (FF 1.0.6 or Safari 2.0.3 on 10.4.4)

You mean there are actually people in america argueing in favour of torture??

Sea Monsters!

Gojira-sized jellyfish attack japanese fishermen

...
Representatives of fishing communities around the country gathered in Tokyo on Thursday, hoping to thrash out solutions to a pest that has spread from the Japan Sea to the Pacific coast.

"It's a terrible problem. They're like aliens," Noriyuki Kani of the fisheries federation in Toyama, northwest of Tokyo, told Reuters ahead of the conference.
...

Why does the blockquote quit after the first paragraph? I would tend to characterize that as a "bug".

We read parts of the Bible in my high school English class. The purpose of this was in part that the Bible is an important piece of literature regardless of your beliefs, but also so that we could better understand Biblical allusions made in the classical literature we were studying. There is more than ample reason to study the Bible for strictly scholarly reasons, and it shouldn't be a problem to do so in a high school class, or any class for that matter. By the way, I should also mention, although years later I learned that my teacher was a Christian, he in no way prosletized or even stated his beliefs.

I'll bet your teacher didn't tell you that the Bible is scientifically and historically inaccurate, that selection of books for inclusion was arbitrary (both Old and New testaments), that all of the alleged prophesies in the New Testament are pulled out of context or entirely fabricated. What kind of education ignores facts like those?

How about a comparative course on:

"English Translations of World Mythology that are Great Literature in their Own Right."

Texts to be studied:

* The Iliad: Alexander Pope
* The Bible: Launcelot Andrews et al. (Sponsored by King James VI and I)
* Volsunga Saga: William Morris

Any more suggestions?

I've never understood the fascination that some have for Gore.

He ran in an election against Bush. For most partisan Democrats, that's enough to elevate him to demigod status.

We read parts of the Bible in my high school English class. The purpose of this was in part that the Bible is an important piece of literature regardless of your beliefs, but also so that we could better understand Biblical allusions made in the classical literature we were studying.

In literature class we once studied some parts of the New Testament, which our teacher said got her in trouble for "proselytizing" last time she'd tried it (mind you, this was in Israel, where there's a mandatory Bible class from grade 2 to grade 12...).

switching gears and harking back to another, recent Pharyngulan Open Thread, Harry Eagar asked in the context of a subthread on the NSA domestic spying revelations what various folks opposed to it would propose to do instead. one of those folks was me. i indicated that early on, in Afghanistan, the tactical nuclear option ought to have been exercised, particularly since al-Queda, Taleban, and whoever were holed up in a remote and unpopulated mountain area. i also declared BushCo a bunch of cowards for not pursuing that. i claimed it al-Queda and Islamist governments were going to pursue nuclear weapons anyway.
now, Chirac has declared France is ready to use tactical nuclear strikes in retaliation for terrorist attacks against France. i'd advise those morons who, in the days when France opposed U.S. intervention in Iraq, declared them to be appeasers and worse to take note.
of course this is hugely unfortunate. had the United States pursued nuclear disarmament fiercely in the early 1990s and ratified various non-proliferation treaties, perhaps we wouldn't be here. but the leadership at the Presidency, the military, and Congress of both parties opted to pursue U.S.-as-empire, so here we are. and our choices are limited.

English Translations of World Mythology that are Great Literature in their Own Right."
.
Any more suggestions?

I guess the Saga of the Flying Spaghetti Monster wouldn't qualify, a the original is in Dnglish, and therefore untranslated.

Oops, that should have been "English". I actually used preview, too.

switching gears and harking back to another, recent Pharyngulan Open Thread, Harry Eagar asked in the context of a subthread on the NSA domestic spying revelations what various folks opposed to it would propose to do instead.

What I propose the US do instead is nothing at all. So far it's been so woefully incompetent at fighting terrorism - indeed, 9/11 happened under the nose of an NSA with extra-Constitutional domestic spying powers - so ending domestic spying will not change anything for the worse.

I posted this on another board today...reposting it
here again as my first post on the new and improved
Pharyngula...

To think that a flat-earther like this would have been loudly ridiculed
-and rightfully so- for saying something like this out loud just 10 years
ago makes me sick and angry at the same time.....

http://www.beliefnet.com/story/183/story_18319_1.html
From the article

Quote:
New Orleans Mayor Says God Mad at U.S.
Associated Press

------------------------------
New Orleans, Jan. 16 - Mayor Ray Nagin suggested Monday that Hurricanes Katrina and Rita and other storms were a sign that "God is mad at America" and at black communities, too, for tearing themselves apart with violence and political infighting.

"Surely God is mad at America. He sent us hurricane after hurricane after hurricane, and it's destroyed and put stress on this country," Nagin, who is black, said as he and other city leaders marked Martin Luther King Day.

"Surely he doesn't approve of us being in Iraq under false pretenses. But surely he is upset at black America also. We're not taking care of ourselves."
-----------------------------------------

Next maybe he can talk about AIDS or diabetes or malaria or dandruff being god's wrath against the sons of Ham........

I have talked about this on other boards, about religion too often being used as a front
to critizise and control others and removing the expectation that the opinion will have
to be defended. Correlate any catastrophic event to whatever religious cause you want to advance.

Great! Now we have an explanation why Florida and Texas keep getting pounded with
hurricanes every year...yea that's the ticket.....god is angry with the Florida presidential
election mess and with the Tom Delay scandal....guess "those people" had better
get their act straight!!

As an atheist, I could care less what his sockpuppet god thinks of me......this whole mess is starting
to look more and more like the Star Trek episode "The Return of the Archons"...

-------------------------------
New Orleans Lawgiver Says Landru Mad at U.S.
Associated Press
New Orleans, Jan. 16 - Lawgiver Ray Nagin suggested Monday that Hurricanes Katrina and Rita and other storms were a sign that "Landru is mad at America" and at black communities, too, for tearing themselves apart with violence and political infighting.

"Surely Landru is mad at America. He sent us hurricane after hurricane after hurricane, and it's destroyed and put stress on this country," Nagin, who is black, said as he and other Lawgivers marked Martin Luther King Day.

"Surely Landru doesn't approve of us being in Iraq under false pretenses. But surely Landru is upset at black America also. We're not taking care of ourselves."
-------------------------------------------

Lawgivers have announced a toned-down Festival in New Orleans this year due to the recent effects of Landru's wrath....

actually, There's been some indicators that Bush was at it before the elections. You know, the ones that, in part, used with Diebold (read Black Box voting .org and .com, as they both have decent information)voting machines. Anyway, Bush is using them to spy on PETA, and I'm sure anyone else that disagrees with him.

I'm all for fighting terrorism, but the particular measures being enacted are being used to grossly overextend the power of government and remove competition and accountability from it. We had the methods to stop attacks on the mainland, we simply didn't execute them. And we can still protect ourselves. This fear-mongering has taken it overboard, though.

link to the PETA article didn't go through.

Johnny Vector sez:
Just widen the window; you're hitting the minimum width. Which is too wide, in my opinion (and really, the column with, y'know, content ought not to be clobbered by the navigation columns). But it works, reflowing the text and all, if you keep the window wide enough. (FF 1.0.6 or Safari 2.0.3 on 10.4.4)

What makes you think my window isn't as wide as I can make it on a 13" screen? Worse, why do you think I would have been too stupid to think of that if it weren't?
I'd love to go back to FF 1.07 but I can't do that without deleting my current profile and losing all my bookmarks.
If you think I should get a larger screen send me the money; PayPal accepted ;-)

Why man imagined nasty vengeful gods as male (ie creating them in his image):
http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/5056.html
http://education.guardian.co.uk/higher/news/story/0,9830,1689837,00.html
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2006/01/19/nbrain1…
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2-1995847,00.html
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/4620922.stm
(several link options for same story)

Redshift
"I have no problem with bible classes in public schools, as long as they're teaching about religion, and not teaching religion."

Exactly. They teach about religion in public schools here in Finland and it's not a problem. We're far less religious than Americans. Besides - it is just as important to know about the history of religions as it is to know about your own history.

These classes should, of course, focus on all major religions equally and have at least some focus on smaller religions as well (as is done here - maybe with a bit too much of focus on Christianity for obvious reasons).

A little old, so sorry if it has been posted before.

First Observation of Tool Use in Wild Gorillas

Pirates captured!

U.S. Navy Seizes Pirate Ship Off Somalia

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates - The
U.S. Navy boarded an apparent pirate ship in the Indian Ocean and detained 26 men for questioning, the Navy said Sunday. The 16 Indians and 10 Somali men were aboard a traditional dhow that was chased and seized Saturday by the U.S. guided missile destroyer USS Winston S. Churchill, said Lt. Leslie Hull-Ryde of U.S. Naval Forces Central Command in Bahrain.
...

I think you'll agree that the Bible is the single most influential work of Western fiction. So in that regard, it's quite appropriate to teach a class about the Bible. Heck, I've been tempted to round up a few like-minded people and start a secular Bible study group; maybe that'd give me the motivation to finish reading the damn thing.

The history of how the Bible was assembled, including the Documentary Hypothesis, is quite interesting as well.

Then there's the fact that a lot of people who claim they use the Bible as the basis of their moral code don't seem to know much about it. Every time someone says that the Ten Commandments form the basis of morality, I want to ask which of the three sets of ten they mean.