Cretin of the moment

Rick Santorum, for looking into a mirror and somehow seeing a honest man completely free of hypocrisy concerning the issue of political interference in science looking out. At least he's consistent in terms of being a political freak show.

New Hampshire: Bergevin/Hopper all over again

If you were reading Lurker back in July you might remember a couple of anti-evolution bills that were presented to the New Hampshire House of Representatives by Jerry Bergevin (R-17th district) and Gary Hopper (R-7th). Unfortunately, the National Center for Science Education has confirmed that both bills have been prefiled and are scheduled for hearings in front of the House Education Committee on February 9th and 14th of next year. Hopefully they'll  both go nowhere fast, but you can never tell in this bizarre little political climate we're living in. Stay tuned.

(Also at WTTFTG)

Higgs? Or not?

The latest from CERN on the ATLAS and CMS experiments concerning the Standard Model Higgs boson, both from the horse's mouth and in a more digestible form at New Scientist.

(Also at WTTFTG)

We've all seen this particular movie before

On the Internet, even advocating a perfectly good idea can cost you; maybe not money, but certainly your sense of security in advocating that idea. This is especially true in the case of skepticism-oriented blogs when dealing with litigation-happy individuals who don't like having their suspect ideas questioned in public. Orac at Respectful Insolence has recently authored a series of articles on attempts by, er, "alternative cancer therapy" physician (read: probable q**ck) Stanislaw Burzynski and his lawsuit-threatening email goon Marc Stephens to silence Andy Lewis of Quackometer; the articles are far too detailed for me to quote at length here, but you can find them at Insolence or (if you're interested in reading them right now) in four easy pieces (namely, 1, 2, 3 and 4).

(UPDATE: Quackometer itself is currently down as of 6:28 CST; whether this has anything to with the Burzynski/Stephens case is strictly left up to the morbid curiosity of the reader.)

(Also at WTTFTG).

Texas and science curricula: same old song, different verse

Just when you thought that the Texas textbook question had been solved in favor of actual scientific rigor, the same old nonsense concerning textbooks rears its ugly head again (a full-length analysis of the issue by the Texas Freedom Network can be found in PDF form here). This was a tiresome issue a long time ago; now it's getting to be beyond tiresome and quickly turning idiotic instead. 

(Also at WTTFTG)

Lynn Margulis, 1938-2011

In Memoriam.(Courtesy the New York Times)

We're way past the "uh oh" stage on this

As the New York Times'  Chrisopher Drew points out in this article, we've got a problem and it's not even one that starts occurring where you would assume it would:

"We’re losing an alarming proportion of our nation’s science talent once the students get to college,” says Mitchell J. Chang, an education professor at U.C.L.A. who has studied the matter. “It’s not just a K-12 preparation issue.”

Professor Chang says that rather than losing mainly students from disadvantaged backgrounds or with lackluster records, the attrition rate can be higher at the most selective schools, where he believes the competition overwhelms even well-qualified students.

“You’d like to think that since these institutions are getting the best students, the students who go there would have the best chances to succeed,” he says. “But if you take two students who have the same high school grade-point average and SAT scores, and you put one in a highly selective school like Berkeley and the other in a school with lower average scores like Cal State, that Berkeley student is at least 13 percent less likely than the one at Cal State to finish a STEM degree.”

With yet more sympathy to PZ Myers: the idiot brigade moves in on Pharyngula

This is ridiculous. Very ridiculous.

No sooner do I post on the subject of PZ Myers receiving some truly moronic emails defending convicted tax evader and creationist/conspiracy theory/antisemitism huckster Kent Hovind at Myers' blog Pharyngula than he ends up getting barraged by Hovind apologists (including his especially vacuous son Eric) proving their complete lack of worth as anything except creative occupiers of  furniture (the thread PZ references can be found here). The following - from the earlier thread - is a good example of the level of "reasoning" that PZ has ended up having to slog through recently:

You are an arrogant jackass. Your pompousness is only exceeded by your stupendous idiocracy. The fact that you are game fully (sic) employed is proof that we were created and it was obviously not survival of the fittest. If there were any true justice in this country, you would be the one sitting in jail. Hey ape-man, go back and crawl under the rock from witch you came and do the world a favor…

Have a wonderful day

Likewise, here's this example from Eric Hovind himself from the bullying thread:

Nerd,
So I start with the pre sup that God is true, and I am a looser (sic). You start with the presup that you can reason that reason is valid. Back to my question, could you be wrong? You said no. Do you know everything?

Clever, no?

No.

By the way, the idiots I quoted might want to keep in mind that these are the reasons that Kent Hovind is in prison; they seem entirely independent of the content of the gargantuan loopiness he's advocated in the past, so it certainly doesn't turn on any bogus First Amendment argument. But then, expecting such twits to understand the difference between advocating wholesale nonsense and engaging in wholesale tax fraud because you think that such advocacy allows you to do so seems an impossible task for them to undertake.  

With sympathy to PZ Myers

You would think that if creationists were going to attack a noted professor of biology on his blog they'd be able to come up with a better attack than "you're a mean doodyhead for calling a convicted felon we admire for no real reason an idiot!", but no.

Cretin of the moment

The immortal Bryan Fischer, proving once again that a nice suit and a majestic head of blow-dried hair still won't cover up the fact that you're a complete idiot.

On the subversive merits of reading SF at a young age.

(Note: this was originally posted at WTTFTG for Speak Out With Your Geek Out; it's not on science, per se, but I decided to include it here as a helpful one-off for Blogger people reading this directly from Speak. Enjoy.)

Many, many moons ago - while blundering through the horror of what's termed "Sophomore year in high school" - an anti-social miscreant primarily interested in punk rock and other forms of loud, abrasive music happened upon a couple of import paperbacks at a long-dead bookstore (across from the more famous but equally dead Wax Trax records on Lincoln Avenue north of Fullerton) in Chicago.

The two PBs in question were a novelization of the Doctor Who serial The Nightmare of Eden and a UK printing of Philip K. Dick's Doctor Bloodmoney: the purchase of the first was inspired by watching the show Sunday nights on WTTW (my last respite of sanity previous to having to slog back to high school the following Monday); the last one, oddly enough, was inspired by my reading an interview with PKD that had appeared in a double issue of the Los Angeles punkzine Slash. Although the book version of Nightmare was better than the actual televised version I saw a few months later, one thing stuck with me about both it and Bloodmoney; it made me want to read. And it made me want to read more SF.

It's now over 30 years later. I haven't read a Who novelization in a long, long while, but I've never stopped reading  - or appreciating - SF. It's almost as central to my attitude towards life (such as it is) as my interest in music, science, history and the like, and that's saying a lot for what is still considered an "escapist" form of literature. "Escapist". Sure. Was Stand in Zanzibar by John Brunner "escapist"? What about The Sheep Look Up, the Jagged Orbit or The Shockwave Rider? None of those novels would be characterized is "escapist" by anyone except a total loon if they had been classified as mainstream fiction, but the "Sci-Fi" tag always seems to take the air out of serious arguments presented in a fictional form merely because people can't get past the BEM/raygun stereotypes they have of the form. The same, sad to say, is true of their perception of the fans - even if you're ridiculously photogenic to the point of being slapped on a cover of GQ or Cosmopolitan, it's automatically assumed that you have secret fantasies of making out with a tentacled alien if you can actually read, say, Ken MacLeod's The Cassini Division with any sense of real enjoyment.

Problem is, that's a load of nonsense. Judging by the bus I used to take to and from work, roughly half to two thirds of the people sitting on it as passengers who were reading anything were reading SF and fantasy. So much for odd make-out fantasies, eh?

So do yourself a favor, kids; the next time somebody knocks you for liking Stargate or for reading the latest Iain Banks novel, remember that you'll be enjoying those books and series and others for life; they'll only be enjoying themselves for a few minutes before they wake up to the reality that they have to go back to flipping burgers after school and that, unlike you, they can't escape to somewhere in their imagination. And you, on the other hand, can.

Cretin of the moment

Dr. Mehmet Oz, for some well-publicized dumbth concerning apples and arsenic.

This part is really telling about his lack of scruples:

His show got this letter (from the FDA) that clearly explains why his measurements were invalid a week before the show was aired, and Oz ignored it and went ahead and broadcast a misleading and hysterical piece. Some public schools are already yanking apple juice from their lunchrooms on the basis of Oz's lies.

Maybe somebody should explain to Oz that arsenic is entirely "natural". Or maybe some orchard owners ought to get together for a big class-action suit.

I suppose I'm jaded; I saw the beginning of that episode of Dr. Oz and quickly changed the channel before he got particularly deep into the segment. I knew what was coming, and that should be a lesson to anyone else still watching his show after he let like John Edward (!) and other assorted hustlers and quacks on to begin with.

Cretin of the moment

Presidential candidate, House wingnuttery magnet and newly annointed anti-HPV vaccine woo-peddler Michele Bachmann (R-Minnesota). Likewise, consider me doubtful on the issue of whether or not she or one of her unlucky staffers can actually produce the person she referred to on Fox News in order to grab a total of $11,000 out of Professors Steven Miles and Art Caplan's hot little hands.

9/11: smart answers to dumb "questions" that remain neccessary

If you came over from Wait 'till the fire turns green, welcome.

Since we're getting close to a major anniversary in the history of the US, a few people insist on rehashing some serious nonsense concerning the events of that anniversary; needless to say, more than a few people have responded with refutations of the more familiar bilge that's been spewed on the subject, so feel free to follow the links to the material in question.

Orac, Respectful Insolence on ScienceBlogs from 2006, "Your Friday Dose of Woo: And now for something completely different..."

Josh Bunting, Buffalo Beast, "5 Ways 9/11 Truthers Are Like Creationists"

Mark Hoofnagle, etc., in Denialism Blog on ScienceBlogs, "9/11 Conspiracies" (a compendium of articles)

RationalWiki, etc., "9/11 conspiracy theories"

Chris Mohr in eSkeptic, "9/11 and the Science of Controlled Demolitions"

Regardless of what pols want you to believe, it's an old, old, old, old world

If you're able to drag yourself away from a blogosphere now contemplating a Presidential debate that found most of the GOP field spluttering on about not "believing" the Theory of Evolution or making incredibly bad, ass-backwards "points" about Galileo (John Huntsman excepted), something of much more relevance to science - specifically, the type of science that evolution deniers in that debate would like to ignore (feel free to peruse Josh Rosenau's piece on this phenomenon or Howard Stern's [!] take on it) -  has been recently uncovered in South Africa:

Two fossil skeletons of early humans appear to mark a halfway stage between primitive "ape-men" and our direct ancestors. A year of detailed study has revealed that the skeletons are a hodgepodge of anatomical features: some bones look almost human while others are chimpanzee-like.

The two fossils, an adult female and a juvenile male, were discovered in the Malapa cave system near Johannesburg, South Africa, in 2008. Both about 1.2 metres tall, they are unusually complete and well-preserved and date from 1,977,000 years ago. Excavated by Lee Berger of the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, and colleagues, they were given the name Australopithecus sediba.

Let's face it, though: despite evidence such as Berger's find, certain career politicians will make a game of proving how much the evidence doesn't matter to them and how proud they are of their ignorance of it. Feel free to shudder at the possibility that one of them may be making scientific policy decisions in the future.   

If you can't sue 'em, lie about 'em

No one expects the Discovery Institute to be particularly honest about anything, but colluding with another like-minded organization in order to make a thoroughly dishonest attack on the California Science Center Foundation just about takes the cake:

The California Science Center Foundation has settled a long-running legal dispute with the American Freedom Alliance ("AFA"). The settlement agreement explicitly states that no party admits fault or liability, and the settlement is a means to avoid the costs of further proceedings. As part of the settlement, the Foundation and AFA agreed to a joint statement that the Foundation would invite the AFA back to hold its private event, and the AFA would decline that invitation. The Foundation is satisfied with the terms of the settlement, which includes a cost of defense payment from the Foundation's insurer, to avoid the expense of further litigation.


The dispute arose out of unapproved press releases that had been issued relating to a private event that the AFA (American Freedom Alliance) had intended to hold at the California Science Center's IMAX Theater. The press releases, for which AFA was responsible, falsely implied that the Foundation or the Science Center were sponsors of the AFA's event. They were not, and as a result of these false and misleading press releases, the Foundation cancelled the AFA's event.
 
The AFA then sued the Foundation and the Science Center for breach of contract and violation of the First Amendment, claiming that the Foundation's cancellation was based upon the purported content of the AFA's program. This was not the case, and the evidence demonstrated that the Foundation was right. Indeed, the fact that the Foundation booked the AFA's event in the first place affirmatively demonstrated the lack of merit to AFA's argument.

Through discovery, the Foundation also discovered other evidence that undermined AFA's claims. For instance, although the AFA asserted that the offending press releases were issued by an entirely independent third party (the Discovery Institute), it was uncovered that the AFA and the Discovery Institute actually had been secretly coordinating the publicity efforts (emphasis mine) and were intentionally trying to make the publicity that led to the cancellation as provocative and controversial as possible. One email among Discovery Institute individuals talked about "letting the jinnie out of the bottle" when "all hell will break lose." The Foundation was certainly entitled to cancel the AFA's private event.

You'd think that the DI and their buddies in the AFA would learn to leave well enough alone. No such  luck:

Unfortunately, it appears that neither the AFA nor the Discovery Institute have learned from their mistakes and false and misleading press releases continue to be issued. For instance, although the Discovery Institute's August 29, 2011 press release states that the "state-run Science Center" paid a settlement amount, the reality is that the Science Center did not pay a dime. Likewise, although the Discovery Institute contends that it was "dragged into the case," the fact of the matter is that the Discovery Institute knowingly and inappropriately issued offending and false press releases leading to the lawsuit. The court in Seattle agreed with the Foundation's discovery position, and forced the Discovery Institute to turn over its embarrassing emails. And although the Discovery Institute touts the fact that the joint statement includes the Foundation's inviting AFA back to hold its event, they ignore the fact that AFA declined such invitation.

Way to raise the level of debate, DI. So when do you start hiring people to leave burning bags of dog crap at the front doors of organizations like the CSFC? It would seem to be the next logical step.

Cretin of the moment

Ann Coulter, again. When does the hurting stop?

It bears repeating

I realize that this news item is over a week old by now, but if you ever run into anyone dumb enough to insist that scientific and medical research are useless, point them in the direction of a PC, Mac, laptop or netbook and have them read this bit of news from the Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine.

Cretins of the moment (a two-fer!)

Ann Coulter, a co-star in one of the worst "films" in history (among other, equally vomitous pastimes or hers), this time largely for playing kissyface with the eminently forgettable Michael Behe.

And while we're on the subject of Michaels of ill repute, Michael Egnor ends up on the Cretin list again with his attempt to defend the Blonde Thing's collection of spittle-flecked drivel titled Godless from PZ Myers' Coulter Challenge.  

Cretin of the moment

Antivaccination twit "Mr. X" (i.e., Rh*tt S. D*n**ls) for the role he played in silencing science blogger and epidemiologist Rene Najera. Commentary via Orac, PZ Myers and lastly Pranab at Scepticemia, which caused an appearance by the litigious little creep in question in the Comments section.

Cretin of the moment

Part-time Texas governor and full-time clown Rick Perry, for reasons that Joshua Rosenau goes into gory detail about on Thoughts from Kansas here, here and here.

So when do the Theory of Relativity deniers start showing up?

The NCSE has a brief piece on a certain other breed of science denialist who's been showing up in state legislatures as of  late:

"The U.S. political debate over climate change is seeping into K-12 science classrooms, and teachers are feeling the heat," according to a report in Science (August 5, 2011; subscription required). Science educators are increasingly reporting attacks on climate change education: Roberta Johnson, the executive director of the National Earth Science Teachers Association, commented, "Evolution is still the big one, but climate change is catching up."

As for the somewhat jokey title to this post, don't laugh too hard: they actually exist.

Astounding signs of progress, 2011 AD

1) Creationism in Texas suffers an Epic Fail:

McLeroy's Folly (granted, he wasn't alone in pursuing it, but he was instrumental in making those clown shoes fashionable in the Texas State Board of Education) seems to have met a spectacular, 80's-era exploding car movie end:

Pop the champagne corks. The Texas Board of Education has unanimously come down on the side of evolution. In a 14-0 vote, the board today approved scientifically accurate high school biology textbook supplements from established mainstream publishers — and did not approve the creationist-backed supplements from International Databases, LLC.

"This is a huge victory for Texas students and teachers," said Josh Rosenau, NCSE programs and policy director, who testified at the hearings this week. In his testimony, Rosenau urged the board to approve the supplements — recommended by a review panel largely composed of scientists and science educators — without amendments, and to reject International Databases' creationist submission. The board did just that, and asked for only minimal changes to the approved supplements.

2) The Lamberth injunction ends, hurrah

I'll admit that I was worried about this, but not to the point that I couldn't see the following ruling eventually coming down:
  
A lawsuit that had threatened to end the Obama administration's funding of embryonic stem cell research was thrown out Wednesday, allowing the U.S. to continue supporting a search for cures to deadly diseases over protests that the work relies on destroyed human embryos.

The lawsuit claimed that research funded by the National Institutes of Health violated the 1996 Dickey-Wicker law that prohibits taxpayer financing for work that harms an embryo. But the administration policy allows research on embryos that were culled long ago through private funding.

U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth, chief of the federal court in Washington, last year said the lawsuit was likely to succeed and ordered a stop to the research while the case continued. But responding to a swift protest from the Obama administration, the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals here quickly overturned Lamberth's injunction and said the case was likely to fail.

Lamberth said in his opinion Wednesday that he is bound by the higher court's analysis and ruled in favor of the administration.

"This Court, following the D.C. Circuit's reasoning and conclusions, must find that defendants reasonably interpreted the Dickey-Wicker Amendment to permit funding for human embryonic stem cell research because such research is not 'research in which a human embryo or embryos are destroyed,' " Lamberth wrote.

Good things come in pairs, if by "pairs" you mean roughly five days apart. Cherry-picking or no, these are both bits of very good news, IMHO.

About those anti-evo bills in New Hampshire

David Brooks (no, not that one) of the Nashua Telegraph authored a column on the bills submitted by Jerry Bergevin (R-17th) and Gary Hopper (R-7th) pushing ID in state classrooms, and - unsurprisingly - their comments say a lot more about them than it does about the dogmatic science it supposedly responds to:

In our phone conversation, Hopper said there was a second driving factor behind his LSR, born of concerns that cropped up when he was 17.

“I had been filled with this theory of evolution, which if you really boil it down, is a theory that we are here by accident, that there is no purpose. The conclusion is that we’re a bunch of accidents … you really have no purpose for existence,” he said.

“Teaching a child that it’s very possible that they were designed would infer that they actually have a purpose. There’s some purpose they were created, so that is a reason to live. Right now, we’re teaching children that basically they’re animals.”

Ah, creationist dog whistles. They never improve with age, do they? 

The NCSE piece that referred me to Brooks' column is a bit more direct about the ultimate point of all of this:

Brooks, for his part, disagreed with the legislators' view that accepting evolution is tantamount to nihilism, writing that on the contrary, "[c]reationism is meaningless, but evolution is a door to infinite wonder." "But," he concluded, "this is irrelevant here, because it has no bearing on what to teach in science class. My taxpayer dollars pay science teachers to teach science, not philosophy. Let's hope lawmakers don't try to get in the way."

Cretin(s) of the Moment

Homeopaths Without Borders (!), for "helping" Haitians in the following fashion:

So let me get this straight. A bunch of homeopaths go into an impoverished Third World country that is still recovering from a devastating earthquake. They find people still suffering from a variety of diseases, including ringworm, vaginal infections, and infectious diarrhea. They see malnourished, underdeveloped, dehydrated infants. And what do they have to offer? Arnica, Aconite, Ignatia, Causticum, Natu mur, Sepia, phosphorus acid, and sulfur, all diluted to the point that not a single molecule is left. In other words, all they have to offer is water and sugar pills infused with that water. They don't even have water with electrolytes in it, such as Pedialyte, which is what these infants almost certainly really needed, along with formula.

Cretin of the moment

Dr. Michael Egnor. "Egnorance" indeed.

New Hampshire: the nonsense continues

It's not up for a vote yet, but the usual predictable boilerplate legislation intended to insert creationism into the classroom is being requested for the 2012 legislative session. And for what it's worth (read: not very much, unless you're truly desperate for a set of opinions from people whose opinion you really shouldn't care about), it turns out that Miss New Hampshire and most of the rest of the field of Miss USA candidates are a bit confused about things.    

One of out two ain't bad

First, the good news: Texas House Bill 2454 is officially toast. Regrettably, the same can't be said for the misnamed Louisiana Science Education Act, since the bill (SB 70) that would have repealed it died in committee.  

While we're on the subject of cell phones...

Both Orac and PZ Myers seem ready to engage in some serious thinking contrary to "the sky is falling!" meme that the WHO report has generated in the media. Whether this and other sane discussion will result in much of anything that resembles a corrective (or even a calming influence) is beyond me.

When a new set of denialists spring up...

...you might want to point out the fact there are scientific ways of ensuring that "Osama bin Laden" is Osama bin Laden, and that there's probably a good chance that there's still enough of him left after his burial in the Arabian Sea to confirm that fact for some time.

Cretins of the moment

The collective anti-vaccination fanatics of the world for helping to bring Measles back to places where it hasn't been in years. Good going, idiots.

Tennessee creationism bills stopped - for now

Both House Bill 368 and Senate Bill 893 ended up running into impassable roadblocks, but considering that one of the people driving this car was the unfathomable Frank Nicely (R-WTF) who wrapped his rhetorical car around a quote that wasn't even authored by the scientist he attributed it to, this should have surprised no one.

42 Nobel laureates can't be wrong

Bobby Jindal (R-LA) really should have paid attention to how seriously scientists take politically motivated attacks on their work. This is yet another It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown moment for him, and all he got was this rock.

Cretin of the moment

Governor Rick Perry of Texas, though he's hardly alone in the hardcore promotion of Dumbth down there these days.

So what *is* it with CBS and anti-vaccine propagandists?

First it's Sheryl Attkisson, and now it's this:

Damn if those anti-vaccine loons aren't pulling a fast one while I'm not looking. It turns out that über-quack Joe Mercola is teaming up once again with Barbara Loe Fisher's the National Vaccine Information Center (NVIC) in a desperate attempt for the NVIC to try to demonstrate that it's still relevant in the anti-vaccine movement after having been supplanted by Generation rescue. This time around, they're doing SafeMinds one better and, hot on the heels of hosting "Vaccine Awareness Week" to spread misinformation far and wide, is now trying for greater notoriety. Via Skepchick Elyse Anders, I learn that Mercola and the NVIC are running anti-vaccine ads on the CBS Times Square JumboTron on 42nd Street.

The sheer, boundless stupidity of Mercola is just priceless, isn't it?

And just think: Andrew Wakefield is coming to Brandeis University, to boot. Big whoop.

(A more direct link to to the Change.org petition Orac mentions in his article is available here.)

Cretins of the moment

The 70 or so willing accomplices to 1920's-era stupidity who voted in favor of House Bill 368 in the Tennessee House of Representatives.

The 2011 Pigasus Awards, and then some

The James Randi Educational Foundation announced them on a completely appropriate Friday, and it's not exactly surprising that at least one of the recipients is also a Cretin of the Moment:

Dr. (Mehmet) Oz is a Harvard-educated cardiac physician who, through his syndicated TV show, has promoted faith healing, "energy medicine," and other quack theories that have no scientific basis. Oz has appeared on ABC News to give legitimacy to the claims of Brazilian faith healer “John of God,” who uses old carnival tricks to take money from the seriously ill. He's hosted Ayurvedic guru Yogi Cameron on his show to promote nonsense "tongue examination" as a way of diagnosing health problems. This year, he really went off the deep end. In March 2011, Dr. Oz endorsed "psychic" huckster and past Pigasus winner John Edward, who pretends to talk to dead people. Oz even suggested that bereaved families should visit psychic mediums to receive (faked) messages from their dead relatives as a form of grief counseling.

My, oh my. The crap that television producers try to pass off as medical fact these days.

But wait! Dr. Oz has a comrade in his questionable endeavors, and she works an arguably more high-profile gig at CBS:

After all of (Sharyl) Attkisson's pandering to the anti-vaccine movement and promoting its message, one huge question remains. Why does CBS News tolerate Attkisson's horrible reporting on vaccines and other scientific issues? I can't speak about her other reporting, but when it comes to science, Sharyl Attkisson is a crank par excellence. She has an agenda; and she tortures the evidence to make it seem to agree with her biases. I also wonder how long it will be before Attkisson joins Dan Olmsted as a writer for AoA (Age of Autism). My only surprise is that, nearly four years since I first noticed her, she hasn't made that move already. I suppose I can always hope that CBS News wises up to the anti-vaccine propagandist working as one of its correspondents and forces Attkisson finally to make that move.

People who wonder why I find it less and less useful to watch large amounts of TV with each passing year should look no further.  You don't have to watch intentionally disposable crap like Jersey Shore or Dancing with Myself (er..Dancing with the Stars, sorry) to find readily accessible mind rot. Not with "medical" or "scientific" reporting like this, you don't.  

Cretin of the moment

The eternally hideous Ann Coulter, for reasons PZ Myers goes into gory detail about at the provided link.

Cretin of the moment

Dr, Mehmet Oz, who seems to be making a habit of this. From the Respectful Insolence piece:

In actuality, what's going on here, I think, is more likely to be pure hubris. Dr. Oz has become so enamored with himself and his image as the iconoclast bucking the medical system, seeing beyond "Western medicine," and being just so much more damned smart than any other doctor that it never occurred to him that he could be fooled by a psychic scammer just as easily as anyone else. Add to that his need to fill the insatiable maw of his TV show with new topics and new guests, coupled with the demands of his audience, who are clearly very much into this sort of thing, and it becomes easy for him to justify having a guest like John Edward as both evidence of his intelligence and open-mindedness and giving the people what they want.

If anything, Oz deserves an extra dose of COTM derision for pulling the odious John Edward out of whatever hole he's been hiding in after the failure of Crossing Over and giving him the exact sort of platform he doesn't deserve: "medical" legitimacy. You just can't keep a career publicity-hungry kook down, I suppose.  

Tennessee: Dunn's Folly continues its march

The antievolution Tennessee House Bill 368 made it out of subcommittee recently, and (with one important exception among the yea votes) the vote was split predictably down party lines.

If you're reading this in Tennessee and want to show up at the full House Education Committee in order to become appropriate irate, contact info is included on the NCSE link I cited.

Japan: will we bother to learn a lesson from it?

Josh Rosenau points out that the most serious lesson that can be learned from the Japanese tragedy of the last few days is not what's gone wrong, but what's gone right:

The difference is that Japan has made a commitment to earthquake-safe buildings, and had the money to carry out that commitment. Haiti lacked the money to implement strict construction standards and a government capable of compelling compliance. Builders and government regulators in the United States have the power and the resources to ensure Japanese standards of construction apply here, but my sense from living in California for 3 years is that we may lack the commitment needed to do this.

He also points out that a major roadblock is in the way, and - as usual - it has everything to do with the current national political climate du jour:

"But Josh," I hear you thinking, "we haven't got a spare $140 billion for the bridges, let alone the money for building retrofits." Indeed, the focus in Congress right now is on cutting government spending, a goal shared by state legislatures. And that's a problem, because government spending, especially job-creating spending like I'm talking about here, is exactly what we need to get out of this economic crisis. And borrowing to build and repair infrastructure is probably the smartest sort of borrowing we could do. It's what most people and businesses do when they buy a home or an office or a factory. It makes sense, because the benefit of the purchase will persist for years to come, and it makes sense to spread the cost of the purchase across the time while it serves its purpose. If I'm to pass a debt on to my grandchildren, I'd like to also let them see what that money bought. I'd be proud to tell my grandkids that they're helping pay for the bridge we're driving across decades from now, and I'd hope they'll be proud of such things, too.

Politicians being politicians, though...

I don't think I really have to finish the above sentence, unfortunately. The conclusion is already buried in the premises. 

DDoS attack on ScienceBlogs originating from "Harun Yahya" sympathizers?

Although I don't have a shred of proof that the most fanatical simultaneous purveyors of creationist and antisemitic agit-prop in the Muslim world actually have anything to do with it. it seems to me that some of the information from the people who run the SB site (repeated by Orac) seems a bit...well...suspect:

Let me apologize again for the problems that many of you and your readers are experiencing. The attack is ongoing, originating from Turkey and Qatar, and until it stops, Rackspace must block IP ranges in order for the site to be accessible to anyone. 

This smells more than a bit fishy, seeing as a description of the Yahya organization's harassment tactics comes exceedingly close to instantly evoking the word "cult-like":

But with so many ideas taken up and discarded, and their leader facing jail, might the group be nearing exhaustion? True, the Science Research Foundation and the followers have initiated thousands of court cases. Three hundred alone were brought against the model and one-time sympathiser Ebru Simsek, who spoke out against Oktar after she refused his advances, and a barrage of faked naked photos of her were made public. Oktar’s followers have shot thousands of compromising videos of everyone who has come into intimate contact with the group. They have intimidated prosecutors, judges and lawyers with endless streams of complaints and faxed denunciations and printed libellous advertisements in the Islamist media, defaming their critics. They have been especially effective on the internet, setting up numerous websites to denounce their enemies, while using the Turkish courts to silence them – the Dawkins site is just one of dozens they have had banned. “They may be only a few hundred people,” one lawyer told me, “but the damage they have inflicted is considerable. Damage to the families, to the judicial system, and to Turkish politics.”

If this isn't the fault of "Yahya" or his sympathizers, someone's engaging in an admirable frame-up.

Cretin of the moment

Florida state Senator Stephen R. Wise (R-5th), for introducing yet another identikit anti-evolution bill (Senate Bill 1854) in yet another state legislature. Also, expect him to be a repeat performer as a legislative circus seal since he also introduced SB 2396 back in February 2009.

Cretin of the moment

Tennessee state Senator Bo Watson, for joining House member Bill Dunn in sponsoring another attempt to reproduce Scopes in the 21st century. And lo and behold, look at the similarities - no, exactly identical wording at times - in language between this bill and another one from Oklahoma (emphasis mine):

Tennessee Senate Bill 893:

The bill would, if enacted, would require state and local educational authorities to "assist teachers to find effective ways to present the science curriculum as it addresses scientific controversies" and permit teachers to "help students understand, analyze, critique, and review in an objective manner the scientific strengths and scientific weaknesses of existing scientific theories covered in the course being taught." The only examples provided of "controversial" theories are "biological evolution, the chemical origins of life, global warming, and human cloning."

Oklahoma Senate Bill 320 (similar to House Bill 1554):

SB 320 would, if enacted, require state and local educational authorities to "assist teachers to find more effective ways to present the science curriculum where it addresses scientific controversies" and permit teachers to "help students understand, analyze, critique, and review in an objective manner the scientific strengths and scientific weaknesses of existing scientific theories pertinent to the course being taught." The only topics specifically mentioned as controversial are "biological evolution, the chemical origins of life, global warming, and human cloning."

They're not even bothering to rewrite the script to this tiresome movie, for crying out loud.

Where woo and military "intelligence" intersect

James Randi details how an Iraqi general managed to both duck the JREF Challenge and land on the "Go to Jail" square in his own personal game of Monopoly. Tres amusing.

Stark's Darwin Day idea

Granted, this has next to no chance passing in a House dominated by soi-disant "Christians" like Bachmann or Shimkus, but it's a nice way of tweaking anti-science zealots in Congress and recognizing the importance of a central figure in the history of biology at the same time:

 Stark told the San Jose Mercury (February 11, 2011) that he was "just trying to get people to understand that we're trying to get our kids to be scientists, were pushing for green jobs and green development, and you can't stick your head in the sand and not recognize that we're in a modern age. To get there, it seems to me, we have to understand that science is all part of what we're doing."

Cretin of the moment

Tennessee state representative Bill Dunn (R-16th), who seems to be under the impression that it's still 1925 down there. Given that this is the sixth anti-evolution bill introduced in state legislatures since the beginning of the year, there are a lot of people who are just as confused about the date as he is.

Cretin(s) of the moment

State Senator Josh Brecheen (R-6th) and Representatve Sally Kerns (R-84th) of Oklahoma, for sponsoring yet two more predictable "teach the nonexistent controversy" bills opposed to teaching of the theory of evolution.

Sun sign, Schmun sign

You might find it odd that a web site devoted to evolutionary biology such as The Panda's Thumb would add their $0.02 to the current "problem" in astrology concerning the proper dating of sun signs (in my opinion, it's only a "problem" if you actually consider this steaming pile of a glorified hobby an actual method of predicting the future; chances are that you shouldn't be reading this blog if you do), but they do here, and as Ian Musgrave says it's for a good reason:

So, basically Tropical Astrologers are complaining that, err, scientists are accurately describing astrology at the same time demonstrating ignorance of fundamental aspects of the sky (and their own discipline). Again, does that sound familiar?

It could be worse, of course. You could be dealing with a practitioner of this pap who waxes threatening every time someone mentions what sort of a thoroughly despicable twit he is, but I'm sure he'll continue to soldier on in his efforts to gain the same "immortality" the thoroughly dead Earl Gordon Curley has established for himself in terms of woo-promoting idiocy.    

Cretin of the moment

Dr. Mehmet Oz. Exhibits one and two courtesy Orac at Respectful Insolence.

America COMPETES act signed into law

Details available here.

Ohio: the cost of firing a dangerous lunatic

Well, former Ohio "science teacher" John Freshwater has been effectively given the boot by his school board, and it's for reasons that are all too clear to anyone with an IQ higher than their shoe size as to why:

On January 10, 2011, the Mount Vernon City Schools Board of Education voted 4-1 to terminate the employment of John Freshwater. A middle school science teacher in Mount Vernon, Ohio, Freshwater was accused of inappropriate religious activity in the classroom — including displaying posters with the Ten Commandments and Bible verses, branding crosses on the arms of his students with a high-voltage electrical device, and teaching creationism. After a local family sued Freshwater and the district in 2008, the board voted to begin proceedings to terminate his employment in the district. Finally, after administrative hearings that proceeded sporadically over two years, the referee presiding over the hearings issued his recommendation that the board terminate his employment with the district.

It's not just the fact that Freshwater is yet another YEC hack who used his science classes to push his religious views in a public school district; as stated above and by Ed Brayton previously, he engaged in behavior that would be considered criminal assault in practically any other environment:

The now-infamous incident where Freshwater burned crosses into the arms of two students, including the plaintiff in this case, took place on Dec. 6, 2007. On December 7, 2007, the parents notified the superintendent of schools, Stephen Short. of what had happened.


Here's the stunning part: Freshwater was not disciplined at all for it. The principal wrote a letter to Freshwater telling him not to do it again, but didn't even place a copy of that letter in his personnel file (he told the parents that if Freshwater disobeyed the letter, then they would place the letter in his file). That was it, the sum total of the school's reaction to Freshwater's actions.

Remember, this cross was 6 inches long on the kid's arm and it was made with a device that comes with a warning never to bring it in contact with human skin. It raised welts and blisters and was a serious burn that will likely leave a scar. A science teacher used a high voltage device to burn that cross into an 8th grader's arm, for crying out loud. Not only should he have been fired on the spot, the case should have been referred to the prosecutor's office.

Since this case dragged on for over two years, it's unsurprising that the Mount Vernon school board will have to pay a heavy sum in order to have this idiot fired even before a possible appeal gets filed:

The largest component of the $902,765 bill that the Mount Vernon board must pay is to the school's attorney, David Millstone, a Cleveland lawyer with Squires Sanders and Dempsey who specializes in employment law. His firm will be paid at least $813,628.

Referee R. Lee Shepherd, who oversaw 38 days of hearing testimony, will be paid $35,749.

Court reporting costs for the hearing will be $45,747, along with security costs of $7,641 paid to the Knox County sheriff's office.


The hearing is among the most costly and lengthy that education experts can recall. Records, however, are not kept.
   
And all of this in order to fire a man who thought it actually would be a good idea to burn children with an electrical device in order to instill religious beliefs he wasn't supposed to be promoting in the first place.

The mind reels.

Cretin of the Moment

Andrew Wakefield, to say the least.