pharyngula

A reader sent me a link to this unpleasant video of Scientologists in Clearwater, FL. I recognize the work: it's by Mark Bunker of XenuTV, where you'll find a whole collection videos documenting the kind of religious fascism Scientology, the creepiest cult on the planet, sponsors. Bunker's videos…

Strangely enough, in Christian philosophy apparently the one on the left is the pessimist, and the one on the right carries the message of hope.

Surely you can't be tired of dissecting Ken Miller yet, can you? Perhaps you're tired of me going over it, though. In that case, Jon Voisey discusses his talk and the Q & A afterwards (don't worry, he's less vicious than I am, despite being an angry astronomer), and Mark Perakh points us to…

Both Proper Study of Mankind and Thoughts in a Haystack have summaries of this bizarre paper that was published in Science last week, showing a connection between a sense of cleanliness and ethical thought. I guess it's not surprising that physical sensations impinge on unconscious decisions, but…

Shouldn't this be a subject for the biologists? Why should breast physics be such an important issue in video games? Don't worry, the link is work safe. Just weird.

I've been tinkering with a lovely software tool, the 3D Virtual Embryo, which you can down download from ANISEED (Ascidian Network of In Situ Expression and Embryological Data). Yes, you: it's free, it runs under Java, and you can get the source and versions compiled for Windows, Linux, and Mac OS…

Oh, no. I've got to add another book to my growing stack: Frederick Crews' Follies of the Wise: Dissenting Essays(amzn/b&n/abe/pwll). If you knew how many books are piling up on that shelf… Here's a piece of Jerry Coyne's review: The quality of Crewss prose is particularly evident in his two…

What to do, what to do…usually I can pull out old photos from a stack of family members on their birthdays. I don't have a stockpile of childhood photographs of my wife (note to self: next time I'm in Washington, raid the in-laws' family albums). This means there's a lack of easy material here.…

This is quite possibly the most offensive video ever: Christian pirate puppets rapping. Seriously, don't watch it if your stomach is at all unsettled.

Jack Krebs has his summary of the KU talk by Ken Miller, and I've also had a bit of a private conversation with Miller in email. I'm not going to post it, but I will summarize my ideas after getting more of the story. Miller is not trying to redirect creationists to fight atheists, and he's very…

I've now listened to a recording of Miller's talk in Kansas. I like it even less. Miller is an excellent speaker. He's persuasive, he's clear, he knows his science well, and he was an impressive participant in the conflict at Dover…and he was on the correct side. Here's the problem: he's wrong now…

I got this email from Alan Kazlev, one of the main fellows working on the Palaeos website (a very useful paleontological resource), which I had previously reported as going offline. Plans are afoot to bring it back, and the answer seems to be to wikify it and build it anew, with a more distributed…

Red State Rabble has an account of Ken Miller's talk at the University of Kansas. "Creationists," biologist Ken Miller, told a large, receptive audience at the University of Kansas last night, "are shooting at the wrong target." Showing a slide of the cover art of "The Lie," an anti-evolution…

A new xkcd comic hits the right note: science isn't about belief. Read the whole thing.

Life is cruel and brutal, I guess. Ya Ya, a seven-year-old panda and new mother of twins, "appeared tired" when nursing the younger cub in a patch of grass, the paper said. Her head sagged, her paws separated and her baby fell to the ground next to her. The panda then rolled on to her side and…

The Scienceblogs Nerd-off contest should have this for a new theme song: Weird Al's "White and Nerdy". First in my class here at MIT Drop skills, I'm a champion at D&D M.C. Escher, that's my favorite MC Keep your 40, I'll just have an Earl Grey tea My rims never spin, to the contrary You'll…

Every week, someone finds something that reminds them of me, and they send it off in an email. I think that every day someone strolls through a fish market and the PZ-spot in their brain lights up like a Tesla coil, triggering odd associations that can only be relieved by grounding them out in an…

The latest issue of Science has a fascinating article on Exotic Earths—it contains the results of simulations of planet formation in systems like those that have been observed with giant planets close to their stars. The nifty observation is that such simulations spawn lots of planets that are in a…

Since I saw this meme at Dr Crazy's place, I thought I'd toss it up here for the commenters to make suggestions. " If I were designing a Pharyngula Halloween costume, it would consist of..." It's actually relevant. I just put out a call at my university for volunteers for Cafe Scientifique, which…

Perusable blogaliciousness for your Friday morning: Carnival of Education Friday Ark #103 Mendel's Garden #5 The Hairy Museum of Natural History has put out a call for submissions to the Tangled Bank, with an early deadline. If you want a shot at maybe seeing your link with a custom illustration…

This is much happier news. Our county Democratic-Farmer-Labor party is having a fundraiser on 5 October, and we have a big-name guest to draw in donors… I'll be there! (One local curiosity: there has always been a fundraiser for the party every year, and by tradition, it's been called "The Bean…

Minnesotans are going to be a little less above average in October, when a gaggle of evil morons hit the state: James Dobson, Tony Perkins, and Gary Bauer are having a rally in St Paul to "motivate pro-family conservative Christians." It may also help motivate us pro-family liberal atheists. Andy…

Go ahead, count 'em. Since there were some comments about octopuses with an odd number of arms, here's an example. Males of this species have a highly modified arm (the one they use for sex) that is tucked away in a pouch, so they have the appearance of a seven-armed octopus. Haliphron antlanticus…

Hallelujah! You'll want to play this mp3 for any of your religious friends and relatives. The chorus will make them jump up and exclaim…something.

There's no official declaration of the Pope's recent consult on evolution, but news is leaking out…and the good news is that Intelligent Design is not going to have a place at the table, and didn't figure in the discussions at all. Catholic News has one source: A participant at the Pope's closed…

I'm having second thoughts about the virtues of proximity to my colleagues of that other discipline after watching this video of people plunking alkali metals into water. Cesium looks…interesting. Fortunately, my chemistry pals aren't British, or I might have trouble understanding their comments.…

The Secular Coalition for America has put together a Secular Scorecard for our representatives in both houses of congress, evaluating them for how they voted on issues of importance (separation of church and state, science, funding religious organizations, that sort of thing) in the past year. It's…

I was reading a review paper that was frustrating because I wanted to know more—it's on the evolution of complex brains, and briefly summarizes some of the current confusion about what, exactly, is involved in building a brain with complex problem solving ability. It's not as simple as "size…

I've been asked if this is a common occurrence at scientific conferences: at an Australian conference on climate change, the entertainment at a social dinner was a burlesque show. And the answer is…no. Every meeting dinner I've attended has had some white-maned elder statesperson of the discipline…

Real Minnesota purists will like this: a new blog, Sky Blue Waters, dedicated to environmental issues in Minnesota. The big story right now is on a major oil pipeline being run through the state, and there are also articles on other Minnesota concerns: energy issues like wind farms and ethanol…