amish paradise

weird al yankovic

we're all just monkeys

dance, monkeys, dance.

we need more like this one..

perlocutionary has a nifty post on a podcast of a discussion ann druyan had with dj grothe.



of course you are familiar with this exceptional lady. if not, have a look at this kick-ass bio i lifted from point of inquiry:

"Ann Druyan is a renowned author, lecturer, and television and motion picture writer/producer whose work mostly explores the implications of science and technology for our society. She is the widow of the great Carl Sagan with whom she was a co-writer of the Emmy and Peabody Award winning television series Cosmos. She served as Creative Director for the NASA Voyager Interstellar Record Project that included music and images on the Voyager Spacecrafts that serve as a greeting to possible alien civilizations. She co-created and co-produced of the Oscar nominated movie Contact starring Jodie Foster, which is based on the novel of the same name that she co-wrote with Carl Sagan. She is also the author or co-author of several other books, including A Famous Broken Heart, and Comet, which was on the New York Times best seller list for two months. Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors, also written with Carl Sagan, was another New York Times best seller. Druyan has a new book out in November entitled The Varieties of Scientific Experience: A Personal View of the Search for God, which explores her and Sagan’s views on science and religion.

Druyan is co-founder and CEO of Cosmos Studios, which produces science-based entertainment across many types of media. Since 2000, Cosmos Studios has produced four documentaries, including “Cosmic Journey” which was nominated for an Emmy for the best nature/science documentary. She is also a Fellow of CSICOP at the Center for Inquiry."

i also enjoyed this article i found on the committee for the scientific investigation of claims of the paranormal, as featured on skeptical inquirer magazine:

"Ann Druyan Talks About Science, Religion, Wonder, Awe . . . and Carl Sagan

It is a great tragedy that science, this wonderful process for finding out what is true, has ceded the spiritual uplift of its central revelations: the vastness of the universe, the immensity of time, the relatedness of all life, and life's preciousness on our tiny planet."

like i said, we definitely need more like this one.

familiar faces i

this is the image that started the whole mess:



this was 'evidence' of all sorts of things.. gods, aliens, advanced civilizations on mars, etc., etc.

but an article on space.com reveals that:

"the feature was revealed by subsequent photographs to be a rather mundane mountain whose striking facial features depend on sunlight hitting it at a certain angle."

as in a previous previous post of mine, we tend to see faces where there are none.

linkmania

i added a bunch of new links today.. blogs i regularly visit and enjoy. have a peek?

my kind of dark ages

msnbc reports:

IOK-1, say 'cheese'!

"scientists said wednesday that they have found the most distant galaxy yet, nearly 13 billion light-years away, in a discovery that could help explain how stars were formed at the dawn of time.

that period, known to astronomers as the dark ages, saw the formation of the first stars and galaxies from elementary particles. scientists had been unable to directly observe that time period until now."

what a wonderful, wonderful universe.

you.. you.. neanderthal!

livescience reports on speculations by researchers that the neanderthal survived until much later than previously thought. clive finlayson, an evolutionary biologist at the gibraltar museum, says that warm climate pockets in the gibraltar area may have served as a last stand, around 24,000 years ago, benefitting this species which deteriorated as the climate cooled too rapidly for it to adapt.

if this is true, neanderthals and homo sapiens roamed the earth during the same time span, their existence overlapping -- as modern humans are thought to have entered western europe around 32,000 years ago -- and it might even be possible that interbreeding may have taken place: a skeleton suspected of being such a hybrid has been discovered.

paleoanthropologist eric delson at the american museum of natural history and at lehman college in new york, says that if neanderthals lasted longer than once thought, the question of whether neanderthals and modern humans interbred is raised again.

my secret suspicions of neanderthals among us just may be confirmed....

it's magic

i own a magical pink dragon that flies around, breathes flowers and lives on the top shelf of my bookcase next to the poster of escher's metamorphosis.

you:
a. think i'm lying
b. ask me for proof
c. think i'm nuts

in which case you're just as closed-minded as i am or

d. you believe me

in which case you're so open-minded your brains have fallen out.

40 years young

"forty years of age, as far as i'm concerned, is still a child. STAR TREK is in its infancy-wait until we really get going."

-bill shatner on a myspace bulletin

soul of star trek

i just found a superior post. inspiring and relevant, especially now.

a passion for the future: the soul of star trek.

thank you, william s. kowinski.

more brains, more brains!

i recently read an article on msnbc in which paul manger, of johannesburg's university of the witwatersrand, says that intelligence is not just a matter of brain size. the assumption that dolphins are highly intelligent just because they have a large brain with respect with their bodies may be mistaken.

perlocutionary recommends this very interesting paper which explores researcher's attempts to discover how the human brain is different from other animals, on many levels.

"As a species, we pride ourselves on the uniqueness of our brain. Relative to our body size, the human brain is bigger than that of any other animal. It may also contain unique structures and patterns of organisation that presumably underlie our intelligence and ability to manipulate our environment. But how did our unique brain originate, and under what selective pressures did it evolve? Some of the answers may lie in the genetic differences that researchers are now uncovering between us and our closest relatives." - jane bradbury

i, toomanytribbles

what is the 'i' we refer to?

is it a body part we haven't discovered yet? is it a function of the brain? is it a soul?

'i', is the collection of all my parts. when i say, my brain, i mean the brain that belongs to the set of all elements of myself, which includes my hand, my lung, my consciousness and my brain.

'i' is everything on my person and every function of my brain.

brainpower

perlocutionary has a great entry on human intelligence with a link to the university of indiana and a university of toronto paper.

it's very interesting stuff and a lot to chew on.

i remember doing my high school senior research paper waaaaaaaay back when -- when we knew waaaaaaay much less -- on human intelligence and found many familiar points and experiments in the paper: split brain studies, animal and artificial intelligence, etc. and the mention of washoe and koko brought a smile to my face.

i have always been puzzled by many people's reactions to measures of intelligence. people who don't hesitate to acknowledge a superior athlete do not acknowledge a superior thinker. people who readily support special education for children with difficulties rarely even think of supporting special programs for the more talented ones, and often resist them.

i once finished an entire year's required workbook material very early in elementary school in canada. the teacher not only could not offer me anything more to do, he was visibly annoyed by my presence... so he took me out to the hallway and instructed me to count the tiles in the hallways for the rest of the year.

yet another traumatic experience.

thankfully, my junior high and high schools were exceptional.

it was also fun to learn that as far as pharmaceutical aids to intelligence go,

"prospective compounds, including modified estrogen and nerve growth factors, seem promising, but the best smart drug may already be in your kitchen: sugar, the energy source of neurons."

anything that leaves me with less guilt is a good thing.

stupid bratz

that's it. never will i purchase a bratz anything for any child.

they started with overly sexually provocative dolls which look like children aimed at kids as young as three. i wasn't overly happy with them, but i still had some measure of tolerance; however, this ridiculous company has created tiny lingerie sets with padded 'bralettes' marketed to children as young as six.

six!!

why would a child need to wear this crap?

i am no prude by any definition. i'm well aware that humans are sexual beings from the womb and express it in a variety of ways throughout our lives. i'm all for children having a healthy exposure to sexuality as a natural part of life. i educate the children i love in sex and sexuality to the best of my abilities, clearly and simply, with no shame. i'm a supporter of pornography for adults...

...but this transformation of children themselves into sex objects for the enjoyment of others is ridiculous. it's damaging to children's sexuality and self-confidence. you just shouldn't teach children that sex depends on cheap frills you can buy at a store. attractiveness has nothing to do with anything you can buy.

i can't even begin to describe the dangers posed to children with respect to pedophiles.

this line's main goal is to increase profits by trapping a new generation of people into a skewed pattern of consumerism. pure exploitation.

bratz distributor, funtastic, tried to defend these products. "the idea of the padding is for girls to be discreet as they develop," a spokeswoman said.

well, funtastic spokewoman, bullshit!! there is plenty of lovely, functional underwear for developing girls and, furthermore, the appropriate age range is much, much older than six.

odd man out

most depictions of our evolution show a direct line from older primates to homo sapiens, and the neanderthal as an offshoot. but, in a live science report, erik trinkaus, an anthropologist at washington university in st. louis, says, "in terms of evolution of our family tree, the genus Homo, we're the outliers and the Neanderthals are more toward the core."

furthermore, he supports that humans are not at the inevitable end of a sequence. "it just happens that we happen to be alive today and neanderthals are not."

"homo sapiens are the only members of our family tree who lack brow ridges. we are the only ones who have seriously shortened faces. we are the only ones with very reduced internal nasal cavities. we also have a number of detailed features of the limb skeleton that are unique."

another blow to the last vestiges of anthropocentric delusions, and yet another example of science's incessant correction of itself.

blackmail!!!!

msnbc reports on an interview granted by brad pitt to esquire. he says:

“Angie and I will consider tying the knot when everyone else in the country who wants to be married is legally able,”

i do admire his using his fame to fight for social issues he believes in... but that's... that's... that's blackmail!!

my 40 year old best friend

today is star trek's 40th anniversary.. and i've been a fan since day one!

it's been part of my life forever and has taught me so much.

so, happy birthday, star trek!

muppets tonight: penn and teller - blast off!!

this is one of my favorite videos from youtube.

besides being great fun, it so poignantly describes my sense of frustration when talking to the brick walls that are closing in on me.

have patience till the very end:

no virginia, there is no santa claus

i was just reading a post by francesthemagnificent on my case against god with regards to his deconversion.

he begins,

"It seems that every theist-turned-atheist, at one point or another, shares his or her de-conversion story. Now it’s my turn."

and i started thinking how fracking boring my story is.

i seriously doubt i was ever previously a theist, but i remember how, at the age of 5, i was at my kindergarten at a protestant school, and i was vehemently attempting to enlighten the other kiddies that there is, in fact, no santa claus.

and that was that.

see? i told you it was boring.

even stevens

pray-offs!!

mad world

i found this on kill the afterlife who found it on positive blasphemy who in turn found it on youtube.



the end is cool.

the time is now.