UnSpace

Today is starting out to be one of those "too busy to be believed" days. I have no idea if I'll get the post about global warming and the moon of Neptune done today. But in the meantime, here are some more quick links I've accumulated:

• From Science Blog, we get the word that "It's official: Nuke attack would devastate U.S. cities." I get the idea no one's surprised by that result. What I wonder about is the effect of a nuclear attack on the political situation. How long do you think the Constitution would last after a nuclear attack?
• Some time, I should film the female budgies fighting, just to point out the similarity of fighting styles to male Peregrine falcons. Hat tip to Jo Janoski's blog. Note: the longer it's been since this post date, the less likely you'll find this slide show.
• Go read the article about Proctor and Gamble Co. winning a lawsuit against the Amway distributors who claimed the P&G logo was satanic. Make special note of the lawyer for the Amway people whining. I'm trying hard to be loving and understanding, but I'm not dredging up any sympathy for the losers who abused religion to make money. I wonder if this means I'm going to have another nightmare.
• There's a retirement notice up over at Wampum. I understand, but I wish it weren't so. If you went over and wished him well, it would be a nice thing.
• Can I do a quick link to a magazine? I was all excited about the April issue of Scientific American, so I could read the story that goes along with The Face. While that was interesting (and a bit of a "duh" moment since the retina is actually an extension of the brain, based on vertebrate development), the really interesting article was Just How Smart Are Ravens? Well, I guess I did manage to link, but you can't read the whole thing there unless you subscribe online or buy the one article. Pick up the issue at the newsstand if you don't subscribe and read both articles!
• You know what? As much as the whole fired U.S. attorneys appears to warrant the removal of Alberto Gonzalas, there might be an even better reason to fire the guy. Department of Justice treatment of public safety personnel applying for line-of-duty death benefits under the Hometown Heroes Act of 2003 is reprehensible. The DOJ denied the only 34 requests they've considered and permitted thousands more to pile up unanswered. Maybe I'm biased, but given the number of fireground MIs that happened while I was a paramedic, I know this is sorely needed.
• Now you can watch the CO2 and methane change through the years. Information like this will help us tailor the approaches to mitigating global warming.
• Bob Buskirk just discovered Pittsburgh Bloggers, which means I just discovered Bob Buskirk. Welcome to the group, and I hope to see you at the next Blogfest!

I've got a meeting coming up where the topic of discussion will be the public safety response to pandemics, with an emphasis on bird flu. Part of me is tempted to take Cirrus the African grey parrot along. Picture, if you will, the discussion punctuated with "Huh!", "Yeah, Right!", "What does that birdie want?" and the all-time show-stopper, the bilabial fricative. I'd have a great time, but I doubt anyone else would — especially the speaker.

So, rather than planning nefarious ways of disrupting a meeting I'm actually interested in (biology, birds, disasters, horrible death — what more could I want, especially since I think Criminal Minds will be a repeat this week?), I thought I'd post some quick links!

• Chris Mooney of The Intersection has a post up at Huffington about yesterday's hearing on political interference in science. Chris wrote The Republican War on Science (a great read and on sale at Amazon.com right now for $6.99 for the hardcover edition) and is currently working on the galleys for Storm World: Hurricanes, Politics, and the Battle Over Global Warming.
• New Scientist covers the same topic from a bit of a different perspective, and points out that the Clinton administration tried the same thing with John Spencer. Spencer claims humanity's influence on global warming is not well understood, and he's also an Intelligent Design supporter. Obviously, I think the guy is dead wrong on both counts, but it's not the government's position to be telling scientists what they can and cannot report, as long as it's not a matter of fraud, incompetence, or mental illness.
• Speaking of global warming, the upcoming report by the IPCC says that action on warming could curb nightmare impacts. I hope they're right.
  
• Writer's Blog links to 6 rules for writing by Robert Heinlein. If you're a writer, go read them to remind yourself of some important basics.
• Want to learn the Lord's Prayer in Aramaic? Maybe this will inspire the Latin-Mass Catholics to abandon their new-fangled Mass in favor of the traditional one.
• Bene Diction Blogs On has a post about a conference for the victims of abusive churches. Making the point, it seems the abusive churches are threatening the organizers, resulting in police involvement. Most churches aren't destructive, but the ones that are need to be stopped by the Christian community and their victims supported. It's also worth noting that it's not only Roman Catholic churches that have the problem, and that much can be learned from the successes and failures of the Roman Catholic Church's response to these problems.
• The American people have thrown the Republicans out of power at the Federal level. Soon, it will be time to do the same thing to the Democrats. Not only are the Democrats screwing up on pork, but also on ethics. Obviously, we'd all be better off if both groups were thrown out of power. Eventually, one would hope the politicians would start to buy a clue. Look at me, I'm an optimist today.
• Here's a good article to read if you're interested in owning a budgie (also known as a parakeet).
• Comments From Left Field has a disturbing look at the possible replacements for Attorney General Alberto Gonzales. I can't believe it, but Mike actually makes Gonzales look good. [Insert "Damned by faint praise" joke here.]
• Braden got a shortwave radio on eBay that he mentioned in yesterday's Open Thread. It looks pretty cool. I'd love to get this Korg Radias from eBay. I'd thought about purchasing it when it last appeared, but decided having the money on hand was wiser. Boy, did that turn out for the best. Sigh. I'd still love to have one of those Radias units. I played one at a local music store and they're wonderful.
• Mmm! Magnets! Powerful Magnets! Lifehacker lists just one of the many possible uses. If you're into crafting, you'll think of numerous needs for these little beauties!
• Mick's post about her physical therapy reminded me of the times I was on "injured reserve" while working as a paramedic. I miss the heavy and hot Hydrocollator packs they used to put on my back for my scapula and shoulder. My shoulder's doing a lot better today, but I still have some pain doing the full "range of motion." I didn't think about it, but I'm lucky. My left shoulder hasn't been too bad lately, and the fall hurt my right shoulder. Given the chronic problems I've had with the left from my EMS days, hitting the right side was the best possible bad thing.
• Six-legged spiders that love to snuggle? Now, that's downright bizarre. The frontmost legs evolved into sensor limbs that they use for touching, so despite being six-legged, they are true arachnids.
• By the way, if you're looking for life on Mars, you might wish to check out the caves. Yeah, that's old news to me; I'm not sure why I didn't blog it before this.

Here's some more quick links for your enjoyment. I'm a little puzzled that the most popular posts on UnSpace are movie reviews and quick links, but I'll be happy to go along with what people want.

• In the case of a heart attack, one study may indicate that mouth-to-mouth hurts instead of helps because of the time it takes away from compressions. It's been known for a while that compressions without mouth-to-mouth is better than nothing, but this is a real surprise. As the article points out, in the case of hypoxic causes of cardiac arrest (drowning, etc.), mouth-to-mouth is still important. In pediatric cases of cardiac arrest, where respiratory arrest is almost always the cause, mouth-to mouth is paramount. If you're a parent, you have to know mouth-to-mouth, full CPR, and how to deal with choking in infants and children. If you don't, please take a class as soon as possible.
• To me, there's no question about whether global warming will occur. The only question left in my mind is whether we have stalled so long in doing something about it, we will be unable to prevent most of the damage. And then there's a post about a catalyst that might make it feasible to turn atmospheric CO₂ into fuel or other usable compounds. The advantage to this process would be we would not have to change the basic infrastructure of our technology. Hydrogen is simply too messy to handle and batteries don't offer the energy density we truly need. Unfortunately, even with the catalyst, converting CO2 into usable chemicals will still be expensive.
• By the way, this past winter was the warmest on record for the Earth. I know it didn't feel like it at times here in Pittsburgh, but it's true.
• The mom claims the dog bit off the infant's genitals. Rob the cynical former paramedic and amateur profiler, thinks the damage to the baby was done by humans. I just don't believe a dachshund would do this. Strangely, I believe an adult human would. From everything I read, the police seem to be thinking along the same lines.
• I stopped and stared at this article: ‘Hairspray's’ the word: Travolta plays fat mom. John Travolta can pull this off. Despite Battlefield: Earth, he is that good an actor. I don't know how much CGI was involved in the picture, but he looks believable in the part, unlike most men in drag in the movies. Kudos to Travolta.
• You'll want to check out The Ig Nobel Tour - a unique experience.
• Going through the Ig Nobel tour, I came across the reference to this paper. They put couples in the MRI to see what actually happens to human bodies during sex and during sexual arousal. I think this proves I am the ultimate nerd. I actually find this interesting from an engineering standpoint. The way the penis flexes during intercourse is slightly frightening. I know how a fractured penis is treated in the E.R., and it's horrifying.
• There are vast stores of water ice found on Mars and this may change proposed Martian missions significantly. It also makes manned trips to Mars much easier to pull off.
• Feel-good story of the day: Amputee found fit to be N.J. city firefighter. Go dude!
• When you think of breakthroughs in quantum physics, you think of big cyclotrons and atom smashers. But a strange triangular crystal may prove that the universe is a string-net liquid. And no, I'm not sure even I understand it completely, but it's really cool.
• Kimberly Reed Photography pointed me to a wonderful blog with tips about photographing your child. The post Blogging Tips to Increase Traffic is good, too!
• A Day in My Moccasins has nice pictures of her Terrace Kitchen Garden. My sister-in-law did something similar last year with bucket tomatoes on her porch. If you're short of plantable land, it's a good suggestion.
• Given the amount of plastics in my environment, this article explains a lot about my hair. One of these days, I'm going to do a Britney on my hair. Given some of the scars I got while a medic, it's not really a good idea. I may look a bit like Frankenstein's monster. Although, come to think of it, at least he had a full head of hair.
• I don't get all the jokes in "Emerging Heroes" but it's still cool. I need to get a lego "Rob." One for winter with a beard, one for summer without. Hat tip to Emerging Sideways, a great blog.

24 is coming on in about an hour and a half, so here's a quick link list to sound off about a few things:

• The Top 10 Worst Hereditary Conditions. Oh, really? Here's their list: baldness, lactose intolerance, acne, having twins, heart disease, obesity, bullying, color blindness, breast cancer, alcoholism. Strange, I don't see Tay Sachs, Lesch-Nyhan's, cystic fibrosis, mitochondrial early-onset type II diabetes, hemophilia, sickle cell, hereditary multiple exostoses, brittle bone, colorectal cancer, alpha 1 antitrypsin deficiency, etc. Now, I won't argue breast cancer, heart disease, and alcoholism are nasty, but I'm pretty sure that, with a little work and a biochemistry book, I could create a list of diseases that are hereditary and won't let you live past childhood. Acne? Lactose intolerance? Baldness? I don't think so. Heck, color blindness may be an advantage if you hunt!
• If Haliburton moves it's headquarters to Dubai, does that mean it will be harder to prosecute them in the United States for crimes against America?
• Thomas Roberts' own story is devastating to read.
• I've wondered about dark matter falling into a black hole. In cosmic terms, black holes are small, and most of the dark matter will miss the black hole — it can't be slowed down by bumping into other dark matter or normal matter, and so it most likely will just sail away again into space. Simple, but I never thought of the answer myself. You'd think that someone who has done numerical simulations of orbits would have realized this. I should have, but I didn't.
• I'll probably have more to say about the ambulance engine shortage, but for right now I'd just like to point out this article.
• My teenage years explained. A must-read for every parent.
• The new voluntary food safety guidelines are worth every penny of the fines they impose on business.
• Speaking of scum, here's an article about the gambling industry betting on whether an artificial leg will come off on "Dancing With the Stars."
• The child is mentally retarded and mentally ill, and his grandmother is having trouble getting him into proper care. Will the child kill the grandmother before he gets the help he needs? Why is this even a question? Update: Just to be clear, I'm not rooting for the child to commit murder.

I took a picture yesterday of a spring flower poking its way up through the mulch it was planted in. Today, when I went to post it, there's just a layer of white outside. So, instead of celebrating the coming of spring, I'm posting more quick links.

• Will someone please remind the Pirates that Freddy Sanchez is a human, not a horse? I'd hate for a terrible mistake to be made. Humans usually recover from leg injuries. Says the man who could run but not walk at the end of cross country season each year in college….
• FDA: Regulating Tobacco Harmful To Health — at least your political health if you're a politician. The tobacco companies had to crank up the nicotine to make it harder for smokers to quit. Currently, a friend has a very advanced form of lung cancer from smoking. In high school when she started smoking, she believed the lies from the cigarette companies that any relationship between cancer and smoking was "junk science."
• Two girls said the word "vagina" during a production of "The Vagina Monologues" and were suspended. Props to the girls and their parents for standing behind them. The word "vagina" is a medical term that should be well known and should not shock anyone. Ya'll realize the point of that one "Scrubs" episode was to point out how absurd it was that Dr. Elliot couldn't say the proper words and used terms like "hooha' and "bajingo", right?
• To prove he was the more fit parent for his daughter, Eric Johnson flew his plane (containing his daughter and himself) into his ex-mother-in-law's house. I can't see the logic in that, and I pray I never do. It's a shame he didn't realize that because he did this, everyone now knows what a complete and utter loser he was.
• Speaking of losers, Fermin Rodriguez stabbed his wife and then gave that knife to his toddler son and told the child "Stab mommy." Had Fermin and Eric Johnson (see above) flown the plane into a cliff face, my concern would have been a) the plane, b) animal and plant life on the cliff and below, c) the rocks, and then d) these two examples of human depravity.
• I'm starting to loike John Edwards a lot. Haven't decided, but the guy is cool.
• Linda Dickerson is taking over the Aviary. Congratulations; the aviary will be able to use her experience in the upcoming capital fund campaign. I know Ms. Dickerson from somewhere, but it's not the bird club meetings. Strange. Usually I forget names but remember who people are in detail.
• Here's why Hugo Schwyzer is a daily read: "I long to see a Christian conservatism that is genuinely compassionate, that sees a Christian agenda as being more about responding to the cry of the poor than the private misuse of the pelvis." He calls it a bumper sticker line, although it's actually too long for that. But it's a better pile of words than I could come up with.
• What is consciousness? The SciAm article discusses some research to help us get a handle on measuring consciousness. Pretty cool. So's this follow-up on the origin of life. On the other hand, 15 Answers to Creationist Nonsense is very useful.
• If you want some more lighthearted fare, read about the scammers of scammers. 419 scams are those annoying "Nigerian wants to give you money" frauds that have stopped appearing in my e-mail. I don't have the time to harass these scam artists like the folks of 419, so I have to get my pleasure by reading about it instead.

There's a lot of fun stuff I've come across that doesn't deserve it's own post but shouldn't be passed by! Feel free to pick and choose!

• Peru has the oldest solar observatory in the New World. The article does a nice job explaining the alignments!
• Speaking of observing celestial phenomena, don't forget that tomorrow at Moonrise, the lunar eclipse will already be in progress! Go out and observe! Here's a link to a Pittsburgh weather forecast. Told ya. Can anyone somewhere else get some photos, please?
• Speaking of people who observe, Stephen Hawking is going on a "Vomit Comet" to experience weightlessness in a ramp-up to getting to space! I so hope he makes it.
• Speaking of Stephen Hawkin, the black hole information paradox is even worse than was thought. My quick take? Hawking rose to prominence because he realized thermodynamics trumped other physical laws. The more we learn, the more thermodynamics appears to be about information. So I'm betting that information is so fundamental to the universe, it will win out over any possible relativity or quantum mechanical consideration. Information might be more fundamental than spacetime, energy, and matter.
• 34 Reasons people stop reading your blog. Yes, I have to work on the "Too many posts that are too long" (among others!).
• I forget where I found this, but Marvin Minsky discusses love. Having just celebrated our 31st dating anniversary, part of me understands what he's saying, but part of me thinks
  

  I've looked at love from both sides now
  From give and take, and still somehow,
  It's love's illusions I recall.
  I really don't know love at all.

• Another good (if occasionally disturbing or even frightening) blog goes on hiatus. Sigh.
• If you run or walk, you probably have had to deal with shin splints. Here's a good article on them. Alas and dang it, there's no quick fix! While chiropractic theory is, in my personal opinion as a biologist, complete and utter nonsense, my experience is that chiropractic practice can be useful, and shin splints are an example of where chiropractors excel.
• Teacher-student liasons seem to have become epidemic. From the student's viewpoint, I remember having a big crush on my 9th grade English student teacher. I did nothing about it, other than work extra hard in the class, because there was no point to doing anything about it. I knew I was a kid and the teacher an adult. Well, apparently I was wrong. I still wouldn't have done anything about it, having no idea how to approach a woman. From the teacher's viewpoint, what the frack are these teachers thinking? When I was a teen, I was a self-centered, under-educated, immature, emotionally unstable, hormone-crazed, whiney twit — and I was far more adult than most of my peers. Maybe the people your own age aren't that much better, but just by existing and breathing for a few years, they must have improved somewhat. Rob's Tip for the Day: If you are an adult and find yourself interested in a kid, that's not love, that's the giant warning alarm that says you're headed to "Crazy Astronaut City" and need to get help immediately! Do not pass go, do not collect $200. Yeesh.
• I like that one: "Crazy Astronaut City." Within the next two years, I'm sure someone will give me an excuse to use the similar "Crazy Politician City."
• Pittsburgh's 2PJs have a depressing take on the attempts to "fix" the problems with the treatment of returning Veterans. The good news is that it's enraging both sides of the aisle.
• A better job than I did on the whole "Tomb of Jesus" can be found at Ben Witherington's blog. I started with the post
  THE SMOKING GUN—TENTH TALPIOT OSSUARY PROVED TO BE BLANK. Scroll down for another post on the topic.
• Mental health treatment for criminals guilty of minor crimes cuts recidivism, costs less, and salvages more lives. We're talking win-win-win here, folks!
• I saw Froth Slosh B'Gosh's post "Is It Wrong???" and thought Phil Foglio. I was wrong.

That's all. Have a good day! Don't forget that eclipse!

Here's a bunch of stuff I found interesting. Enjoy!

• Senator Arlen Specter missed one vote out of 52, and Senator Bob Casey Jr. has yet to miss a vote. Senator Murphy missed 2 out of 102. If you're not from Pennsylvania, check out your senator here. You can find your House Rep here.
• Because of poverty and a mixup in addresses, a child died from a toothache. There's a correlation between poverty and Type II diabetes. I wonder if poor dental care is part of the equation?
• That reminded me of the patient who had an abscessed tooth and called 911. The abscess ruptured such that the purulent material made it's way to the mediastinum, turning a minor pain emergency into a major cardiac emergency. Is it any wonder my motto was "You call, we haul"? I tried to look up some information on that kind of emergency and came across this instead: DESCENDING NECROTIZING MEDIASTINITIS: AN ANALYSIS OF THE EFFECTS OF SERIAL SURGICAL DEBRIDEMENT ON PATIENT MORTALITY. Ok, now that's just nasty. I'm not sure anyone's going to want to click on that particular link, but it's a fascinating article. I'm surprised the mortality is only 25-40%.
• Speaking of odds and cavities, NASA predicts a "[ . . . ] 55 percent chance that some sort of space debris could penetrate the space station [ . . . ] and a 9 percent chance of a "catastrophic result over a 10-year period" [ . . .] . That idiot stunt the Chinese pulled with their old weather satellite and that failed Russian booster that exploded in orbit over Australia sure don't help.
• I was asked to blog for a local campaign. Now I see why I didn't want the job. That's on Salon, which means the link works as I write this; it may not for long, or may require earning a "Site Pass."
• I remember when the announcement came out that the quark jets weren't as energetic as expected from collisions at the Relativistic Heavy-Ion Collider. It turns out that String Theory is actually capable of making a prediction on this result, and it matches up pretty well. I didn't think there'd be a decent test of String Theory in my lifetime. Cool if it holds up! Cosmic Log also covers this announcement, and in a more readable for the general audience.
• I don't know if he's quite a "Deathlok the Demolisher" fan like I am, but Multi-Medium posts a good Deathlok quote: "Cynicism isn’t maturity. Callousness isn’t strength. Pretending you don’t care so you don’t have to try isn’t 'winning.' What you do with your life matters."
• "Hail, hail, the gang's all here." We created a spaceship that can be wrecked by hail. Ya gotta wonder….
• The Japanese whalers are giving up and going home. I'm pretty sure this is my definition of schadenfreude.
• As a public service reminder, I'd like to point out that medical professionals practice medicine. No, we don't have it right yet, we're still practicing, and those extra vitamins you take for your health might be killing you.
• Chris Mooney's book Storm World is in the galley stage right now. Almost there, Chris! Hang on! You can pre-order from Amazon.com. Why's it teamed with "The God Delusion" though? Chris wrote The Republican War on Science, by the way, a great and important read.
• If you're pregnant, remember that it could be worse. If you were like an Australian skink called a stumpy, your baby would be the size of a 7 year old!
• Speaking of pregnancy, I never thought I'd hear of "spontaneous symmetry breaking" (a fancy term that shows up a lot in particle physics) in biology. But it turns out that it explains how only one X chromosome is turned off in mammals. If you don't turn off one chromosome, you'd have too many genes active — you only need one chromosome, as men prove. It turns out a blob forms in between the two X chromosomes when they line up. The blob moves randomly to one chromosome or the other and latches on to a special section, keeping that chromosome from being turned off. The same process works in men, but since there's no other X chromosome, the second chromosome isn't turned off. Cool!

There's a lot of interesting stuff today in the news, but Nancy deserves more attention than this blog, so here are some quick links to inform you. Writing this will be interesting. The Firefox tabs are many, and the browser is starting to misbehave. Will I finish writing this post before the whole thing crashes?

• Speaking of Valentine's Day, an article on Fox discusses why "Women Settle for Mediocre Sex" and suggests what to do about it.
• I read some articles about whether Muqtada Al-Sadr is in Iraq or Iran, and I had a horrible thought: the question should be whether he was buried in Iraq or Iran. Perhaps I should get t-shirts printed that say "For a pacifist, I've got a nasty streak."
• My online friend Mark Rauterkus (I can spell that without looking it up; I've got long-time friends whose last name I don't know, so Mark should take that as a compliment) wants to make it easier for third party candidates to get on the ballot. Here's why easing 3rd party restrictions is a bad idea.
• Rupert Murdoch, the man who belittled the deaths of Americans in Iraq, making them a cheap price for "$20/barrel oil," himself put the lie to "Fair and Balanced":
  

  Asked if his News Corp. managed to shape the agenda on the war in Iraq, Murdoch said: "No, I don't think so. We tried." Asked by Rose for further comment, he said: "We basically supported the Bush policy in the Middle East…but we have been very critical of his execution." (italics mine)

• Daniel Walker collapsed while running. He was put on a heart-lung bypass machine for four days (his own heart stopped) while awaiting a transplant. His own heart recovered enough that it could be repaired, obviating the need for a transplant. "Walker's cardiac surgeons said they could not account for the young man's recovery." I like miracles and all that, but y'know, giving the heart four days of rest (something hearts normally never get) would explain a lot — and it wouldn't be the first time. There was a transplant patient whose original heart was left in the chest during the transplant. When the patient rejected the heart about a decade later, they found the original had recovered. I wish I could find a link to that story — I thought I blogged it on UnSpace.
• This false-color image from NASA is just too cool. Cosmic Log has a good explanation of what you're seeing — or what's seeing you!
• Of the "Unfortunate Valentine's Cards," this one's my favorite. You'd expect that, wouldn't you?
• Giving the homeless a house is more cost-effective than housing them in shelters. Yeah, that's me looking dumbfounded. But hey, I'm willing to go with what works.
• Stealing the church (no, I don't mean "from the church" — read the article) was bad enough, but he blogged about it? As Hank Hill would say, "That boy ain't right." And, in a thought I've been having far too much lately, if you're going to do something like that, there's better ways to do it.
• Country radio is boycotting the Dixie Chicks. I guess I'm going to have to boycott country radio…and maybe buy some of their CDs to boot.
• "China said to swear off anti-satellite tests." The super geniuses at the Chinese space agency discovered their little misadventure in blowing up satellites has pumped a bunch of shrapnel into orbit — the same orbit they like to fly their takionauts in. Hey, guys, I hate to tell you, but it is rocket science, and apparently you're not qualified. As a Christian, I'm not supposed to call people morons, so you'll notice I'm having trouble finishing this item.
• Don't ask Neil deGrasse Tyson to speak for Black History Month. Cool dude, cool interview.
• Genes have been found that predispose someone to Type II diabetes. When they're done looking, they suspect there may be as many as 20, and it may give some hints as to better treatments and ways to target interventions. By the way, the genes are "ancestral," which means they have a purpose. Told ya.
• Prickly City is a good comic, albeit more conservative than I. It's one of my daily reads. Here's the dialog from Monday:
  

  Carmen: In a recent interview, when asked why he had not vetoed as single spending bill, President Bush said, "Because the United States Congress that was controlled by Republicans exercised spending restraint."
  There is a pause at this point.
  Winslow: He wasn't kidding, was he?
  Carmen: Not unless "ballooning Federal government" is a punch line.

• I've committed most of these sins.
• A Wrinkle in Space-time.
• This article about the "simpler" way life may have come into being had me puzzled. This is what I've thought for years must have happened. You mean I had it wrong, but that was right? Long article but good.
• Everybody's linking to "Black Saturns." The ring's just a Kerr hole, right? Why do you need 4 dimensions for a Kerr hole? I wish I had someone to ask these questions to. I asked someone who I should ask and they told me "I always ask you." Big help.
• About half the people I know need to take this article about intelligent children with them on the next visit to the psychologist or psychiatrist. That includes me and, if you're reading this blog, probably you, too.

Maybe I should rename this blog "Chocolate Manhole Cover." Yeah, I know Niven wrote "What Can You Say About Chocolate-Covered Manhole Covers," but I like the idea of it being chocolatey goodness all the way through. Not that I could eat it…at least in one sitting!

There's a few items clogging up my Firefox browser, so how about I post them here? They're all pretty cool, although one's a bit disturbing (at least to Nancy):

• What's the purpose to MoodJam? I don't know — I'm just having fun with it!
• Reading this article about Anti-Valentine makes me happy I've got Nancy and sorry for those that don't have someone wonderful to love.
• I'm learning about themes and moods in my online photography class, and so "What Does 200 Calories Look Like?" caught my eye. Well, that and I need to lose some weight. I found this item on LifeHacker.
• If you're wondering how the attempt at a Superbowl proposal that wound up on a localized Veronica Mars went, you'll want to watch this video. Actually, you'll want to watch it just because.
• Is it "Super Bowl" or "Superbowl"? I see Super Bowl more often, but this grammar site uses both. Perhaps my problem stems from speaking German as well as English. I'll make anything a compoundword.
• One thing I'm sure of is that it's not "Superbowel".
• I like these photoshopped pictures of animals. Nancy was freaked out, and not in a good way.
• Your doctor may not give you the best care, based on her or his beliefs. The one that surprises me is the "no sedation of dying patients." That one's clearly an appropriate use of medicine, and not just because I'm dealing with some significant pain from that oral surgery I had. If anything, fear of unrelieved pain is a known reason for people to support euthanasia. If you can assure a patient that the pain will be managed, they're less likely to seek to kill themselves.
• The 12-fold way to Blog Nirvana fits well with my experience.

It's been a while since I did the "quick links." Here's some for you:

• Handlers returned an escaped Arkansas chimp to her cage after she cleaned the toilet and refrigerator. I'm betting he "accidentally" escapes once a month from now on.
• The good news? A cheap, safe drug has been found that kills most cancers. The problem? It's cheap and unpatentable. Drug companies aren't going to be interested in it. Since the medicine is currently in use for other illnesses, I'm curious if doctors will begin "off-label" prescriptions. And yes, if I didn't have to worry about the parrots, I could make this stuff in my basement.
• Mimicry: to copy another's actions exactly. Imitate: to adapt another's actions to oneself. Cirrus our African grey parrot mimics the phone and microwave. With words, though, she will sit there for hours attempting variations on the tone, inflection, and even combination of words. She's imitating, not mimicking. I had no idea I could have gotten a paper out of it. Yeah, that's Dr. Pepperberg and Alex again, along with another bird they're working with.
• Pesquet parrot babies hatched! The strange thing is, looking at the babies, I can tell the difference between them, budgerigar, lovebird, and cockatiel babies.
• Parrots do not have to "parrot" human speech, but they usually do. There's a cute story from Thailand that explains why.
• The Unseen Blogger links to a article by a chemical engineering company that claims CO2 is being driven by the temperature, not the other way around. To do so, you have to ignore the energy balance equation. This is the sort of nonsense that's being done to block doing something about global warming. If you read down the paper, you'll find a new reason they're promoting for not doing anything: It's too late.

For a more reasoned and sensible view of climate change, I'd recommend New Scientist's Environment Special Report.

• Funky of Ales Rarus sent me a link to this post. I think this is a nice response to the militant atheists.
• Patients with Multiple Sclerosis appear to do better if they are infected with parasites. In fact, the improvement is "dramatic." This seems to promote the "hygiene hypothesis."
• Strange, right around the time people are being encouraged to quit smoking, the most addictive substance in cigarettes — nicotine — increases. The cigarette companies claim this is pure "coincidence."
• Muslims are denouncing Sheik Feiz Mohammed, who released a series of DVDs calling for child martyrs and called Jews "pigs." Pretty much everyone else is denouncing this menace, too.

There have been some interesting things collecting in my browser tabs. Here they are! The quick links are an eclectic bunch this time, ranging from astronomy to criminology to the translation of the word "cockatiel." I hope you have fun. Me? I'm going to go soon and get dinner at Taco Bell. Nancy can have what she wants, and I can have a couple beef burritos. They require almost no chewing!

• Is there a giant wind vortex on Uranus? The title of the Slashdot article is "Hubble Discovers Dark Spot on Uranus." The following comments are as juvenile as one would expect.
• Austin Cline gives us an atheist's view of Christianity. I would argue that not all Christians are as he insinuates…and I'm tempted to print up one or two of the posters for my own wall. The posters are well worth looking through.
• For those interested in the mind of the criminal, 10 Myths About School Shootings is a must-read.
• I forget when, as a child, I learned that wishing real hard that bad things weren't true did not change the bad things.
  
• Her bird's gone, and I feel sorry for that, so I won't mention that the bird is a cockatiel and not a parakeet. I wonder if this is a translation error.
• Adult stores are changing their image. I can't help but wonder, though, if they'll be more successful if they became a little less harsh and a little more romantic.
• The Pro-Life Case for Contraception. And yeah, those of you who know recognize some irony in me posting this.
• Getting old sucks. Reading that it's affecting Eric Clapton's playing makes it worse.
• When the Sweedish Acadamy for the Nobel Prize calls, here's what not to ask them.
• Speaking of Nobel Prize winners, here's some more stuff on Antisense RNA.
• Italy has cut sudden death in athletes with a screening program that detects cardiomyopathy. But American athletes die from a different kind of cardiomyopathy, and such a screening program might not work.
• We're all worried about Iraq or Mark Foley's adventures in pedophile IMing, which is causing the worst problem to be ignored. And that's one neither the Republicans nor the Democrats deal with well.
• If we make malpractice harder to sue for, will that make doctors less likely to prevent medical errors? I would like to suggest that the problem is that medicine is becoming too complex for humans to handle. As I watch the vet's office become more and more computerized, I'm convinced that machines assisting medical practitioners will be the next wave. After that, medical practitioners will be assisting the machines. Eventually, humans will be dropped out of the loop, giving us Larry Niven's autodocs.
• Why does Spider-Man's webbing come out of his wrists and not his butt? This is one of the classic Spider-Man jokes. It turns out there may be a very important reason, and now we know!
• I don't think children acting up would have made things better — I think there would have been more dead at the Amish school. But Laurie Mann makes an interesting point. Why don't we start teaching children in pre-school strategic ways of dealing with enemies and killing them? It will prevent more school deaths and, when the kids graduate from high school, they'll be better equipped to go fight and survive in the Middle East.

Once again, I've got too many tabs open on my browser window. So here's a bunch of links to things I find interesting and/or ignored that shouldn't be. I think you'll have fun, as the list ranges from Mars to Pakistan and from Republican family values to what you shouldn't feed your dog if you want your dog to live:

• Keith Olberman received a threatening letter, and the New York Post (owned by Rupert Murdoch) mocked him for responding appropriately — and also risked damaging the FBI investigation. Shame on Murdoch.
• Both Terri and Steve Irwin felt he would die early. She believed he would die falling from a tree. If you've ever seen Steve climb trees to become friends with a primate, you know why she felt this way. He befriended the primates because they knew a) he posed no threats climbing trees and b) they felt sorry for a creature so handicapped that still tried hard to be arboreal. Steve felt he would die in an MVA, not unreasonable given where he was often driven and even how the people driving him sometimes drove.
• We're quite possibly one degree Celcius from environmental disaster.
• Bush said that the leaked excerpt of the National Intelligence Estimate did not give an accurate view of the situation. So Bush declassified portions of the report, a report that normally soft-pedals how serious things are. What he released shows that the growth in terrorism thanks to Bush's adventure in Iraq is far worse than the leaked portion indicated. If this is the watered-down version, I wonder what the Intelligence Community is really thinking.
• The Opportunity rover is at the Victoria Crater's rim. This may be the most interesting feature the Rovers have looked at. Honestly, there's nothing else within driving distance. When it comes time to decide whether to send the robot into the crater, I believe they will decide to do so, expecting it to eventually die there.
• Did they really expect the Rovers to last over an order of magnitude longer than their 90 day warranty? No. They expected both rovers to be dead, so they used an extra transponder from the Spirit Rover build in the Mars Reconnaissance Observer. The frequency of the transponders is hardwired. No problem! Spirit will be long gone, no longer transmitting, when the MRO is ready to send images. Except the MRO is up and running, and so is Spirit. Oops.
• By the way, the MRO photos are incredible. Here's the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter's web site. Add "reconnaissance" to the list of words I have trouble spelling.
• Rep. Foley quit, and the Republicans are getting nailed to the wall for knowing this guy was thretening the safety of high school students by attempting to proposition them sexually. This was the same guy who deplored Clinton for consensual sex with another adult, albeit someone under his employ. Sure, Foley and the Republicans deserve everything they're getting — is this really Republican "family values?" But you know what? Had it been reversed, the situation would have played out the exact same, with just the names changed. If you're a Democrat gloating over Foley's fall, think about that. And if you're a Republican claiming too much is being made of this incident, you need to get your head examined, too.
• The same thing goes for this Republican official who was murdered by her husband. What the article doesn't say is that succinylcholine paralyzes the muscles, stopping breathing. It doesn't knock you out. Death is by suffocation; the victim knows it but can't do anything. Is this really what they mean by "family values?"
• Speaking of family values, read this article and think about "abstinence only" education as well as the other side pushing the concept that humans are animals that cannot control their sexuality. Everyone's insane, if you ask me. Even me.
• Bush is opposed to states that sponsor terrorism, as long as they're not supporting us in the war on terror. PaKistan and India both have nuclear weapon capability, by the way.
• I waited a while before posting this one. I wanted to give Powerball of Powerblog! a chance to post it. Had it been any church but the Catholic church, he'd have talked about this incident. But the new meme is to only hold those you consider your enemies accountable. Your own people get a free pass. Once again, realize that I don't think those on the Liberal side would do much better.
• For all the fuss about the Abramoff scandal, and for the White House trying desperately to minimize the connections to the man (which every new revelation makes look far worse as a result), there's something else fascinating in that linked article: Abramoff wasn't even that good at peddling influence. In a lot of cases, giving the dude the money to pimp your cause was money down the drain!
• So they're going to use hormones to change the sex of fish. As a fishkeeper who's had to put up with that show-quality (yes, they have betta splendins shows, just like dog shows) Siamese Fighting Fish female that spawned turning into a so-so male (also capable of spawning), sex change in fish is no big deal. I keep telling folks that sex is not as fundamental a concept as everyone thinks it is, and I can't define "male" and "female" scientifically in a way that would last 10 seconds. But even worse: what happens when the humans eat these fish and get these hormones? Especially pregnant mothers? Already, we know that the hormones given cows promote bearing twins in human women who drink milk. As ambiguous as human sexuality can be at times, this will only make it worse.
• Do not feed your dog xylitol, a naturally occurring artificial sweetner. "Naturally occurring artificial sweetner." Isn't that an oxymoron? Raspberries, plums, corn, and wood contain xylitol, not that you probably eat much wood. Anyway, xylitol is implicated in the liver destruction and/or deaths of several dogs. Xylitol doesn't seem to kill humans, but heaven help you if you eat too much of it. Xylitol is a sugar alcohol. Sugar alcohols are known for causing such fun as explosive diarrhea with flatulance. Anyway, until further notice, don't feed this stuff to your pet — dog, cat, parakeet, guinea pig, or rat. Actually, the rat's probably pretty safe. I'm guessing, here, but I bet when they tested xylitol to see if it was safe for humans, they used rats. But unless your rat is 10 lbs. and in major need of a diet, why would you feed it xylitol anyway?
• Speaking of rodents, "Snakes on a Plane" aren't nearly as dangerous, apparently as "Hamsters on a Plane." Snakes don't chew important wires that keep the plane flying.
• Am I the only African-American blogger in Pittsburgh? If you've met me, then you know how sad that state of affairs is. Yet no one has been willing to tackle the very issue brought up in the Post Gazette article "Race sensitive issue at Duquesne Univ.". Think about it: when you heard that there was a shooting at Duquesne University, what color did you picture the shooters? When you heard that the victims were all on the basketball team, what color did you picture the victims? Yet the Association of Black Students doesn't want to talk about it. I suppose we shouldn't blame them. They're only children. [Insert Monty Python and the Holy Grail routine about the Holy Hand Grenade of Antioch.]
• Proof I am a complete rotter. I told Nancy about the development for a new geometry of fuel pellet for nuclear reactors — the reactor can use more of the nuclear fuel and run at a cooler temperature. I was watching her face to see if she'd have microexpressions that would reveal that this was what she was working on back when she was designing these things for nuclear reactors. Of course, she realized exactly what I was doing, and responded in a way that makes me think she'd be great at poker. I understand she used the same deadpan expression on clients when she was a therapist. Anyhow, I realized that it couldn't have been — the geometry change is too radical, and would have required a new reactor, something the Navy probably wouldn't have been too excited about. Anyway, the new geometry means that reactors built with this type of fuel pellet are less likely to have an "oopsie!," since they run at less than half the temperature of a normal reactor (700C vs. 1800C). Since they make better use of the fuel, there's less to bury when you're done. As an environmentalist, I see nuclear power as one of our only ways out of the global warming problem, but it's a near-faustian bargain. Finding ways to make it safer is a must.

Today, Nancy set up a table at the East End Food Co-op Art Harvest today and showed some of her Pysanky eggs. We had a great time, met a lot of people, including two amazing teens that I plan on telling you about tomorrow. Tonight, I'm exhausted, especially since I wound up standing 6 hours. So how about some quick links? It will let me clean out my browser tabs!

• Have you seen "The Inner Life of a Cell" yet? Skip my explanatory post if you want, I don't care. Just go see the video. It's guaranteed to be the best 3 minutes you've spent today. I lay awake last night imagining billions of walker proteins hard at work in my body. The thought was humbling!
• Two premature infants are dead because of dosing errors in Indiana. Infant and adult heparin comes in similar packages, and the medicine in the PICU dispenser was the wrong one. A similar dosing error occurred many years ago to a patient under the care of Pittsburgh EMS: IV push and IV bag lidocane (far more concentrated) came in identically-colored boxes. That incident caused many medicines to be distributed in packages that looked dramatically different, based on concentration. Two children are dead because not all medications were so coded.
• Ideas for seeing fall foliage can be found in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. A guide to Pennsylvania folliage can be found here. With me and Nikki, my Nikon D50 camera, y'all can figure what I'm hoping to do!
• May the Creator of all space bless and protect the two new ISS crewmembers Mikhail Tyurin, Lopez-Alegria and my favorite space enthusiast, Anousheh Anzari as they take off tonight for the International Space Station. There's an interesting interview with Mrs. Anzari over at Cosmic Log.
• I was going to pull a "Carbolic Smoke Ball" and suggest that Cyril Wecht be called in to do the second autopsy on Anna Nicole Smith's deceased son. There are times when I think humor is too dangerous and I should just leave it alone. Like right now.
• Speaking of local humor blogs, Ms. Adventures on the Mon published something by Vivian, the disgruntled copyreader, that was dead-on serious, well-written, and correct. As I understand things, Vivian was fired, which is going to make reuniting this group into a cohesive whole difficult. I hope Ms. Mon. relents and brings Vivian back. I liked the article.
• If we were going to go to war with Iraq, then we should have gone to win, set up a healthy government, and get out. Instead, Iraq was turned into a breeding ground of terrorism. America is less safe because of how the Iraq war has gone. Iraq was not a terrorist threat before. Now, if we pull out, it will be. This should not have been. If the Washington Post article is true, those responsible for this idiocy should be tried for crimes against American soldiers and against the people of Iraq. I am generally against the death penalty, but this may be a case so egregious that there is no other just action. Thousands have died as a result, including many of America's bravest daughters and sons.