I have always thought of “Flat Earthers” as something of an insult, something you say about people who cling to long-disproved beliefs (hence the comment by President Obama a few years ago in reference to climate deniers). Honestly, I had no idea that the whole Flat Earth Society thing was making some sort of comeback, but apparently it is. I guess it shouldn’t surprise me, but it does.
Tag: science
Pity the poor cockroach
Geoff and I were watching an episode of Criminal Minds the other night and a super familiar thing happened. It’s something that happens a lot on TV and it always makes me roll my eyes, but this time it irritated me enough to make me want to come here and get all science-ranty about it.
I should probably say before I get started that I genuinely like Criminal Minds and that I’ve been watching it off and on since Season 1. This problem is not specific to any particular show but to all TV and Movies that need a Big Scary Bug and science be damned.
Btw, there are photos of bugs after the jump. Lots of them. You have been warned.
So, to all of you still hating the Patriots, especially Roger Goodell…
you are still wrong. Oh, so very wrong.
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Jimmy Kimmel fights back against scientific illiteracy
And it is just fantastic. And funny.
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Reasoning vs. rationalizing
Science is important. It is something that both Kelly and I take quite seriously. It’s one if the reasons Kelly has worked as a science educator for a decade, and one of the reasons why even some of our hobbies involve a lot of science. We feel quite passionately about it.
And it’s also why we both get so frustrated about the problems with scientific literacy in America – demonstrated by things like this survey that shows the gaps between scientists and the public when it comes to views of science. And if you want to see scientific ignorance displayed in all its factually-challenged glory, and I mean some truly godawful stuff, just turn on a television.
Calling all Boston area Rock and Mineral geeks!
The Boston Mineral Club is having our annual Auction on January 10th. (That’s this Saturday for those of you following along at home.) Geoff and I are rock nerds. I’ve been a huge rock nerd since I was a kid and I’m THRILLED that I’m finally going to have a chance to go to a live gem and mineral auction in person.
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Another maritime mystery closer to being solved
The Canadian government announced yesterday that it had discovered one of the lost ships from Franklin’s Expedition, the British Arctic exploration voyage led by Captain Sir John Franklin that disappeared in the 1840s. While it is still unknown whether the shipwreck is that of HMS Erebus or HMS Terror, it is pretty clear that one of the two vessels has been found by an remotely operated underwater vehicle using side-scan sonar.
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The Faceless Men in ASOIAF/GoT
So I haven’t written much lately, and I have been meaning to do something about that.
I have had this idea in my mind about some stuff from the books (and some on TV too, but mostly the books) concerning the mysterious assassins from Braavos: the Faceless Men.
Don’t call up Bruce Willis yet, but…
a fairly sizable asteroid has been spotted on a trajectory that gives it a fairly decent chance (about 1 in 4,000) of striking the Earth. That is actually better odds than the chance you will get killed in a traffic accident any time you get in a car (1 in 6,700). At one point the odds were actually being calculated at 1 in 300. So this particular object has raised a few eyebrows, to put it mildly. Enough that some people think it would be time to call the drilling crew together. Or something.
Well-preserved wreck in Baltic Sea to be explored
The 16th century Swedish shipwreck Mars the Magnificent will now be explored thanks to a grant by the National Geographic Society. Like similar wrecks (the Vasa comes to mind immediately) the wreck of the Mars is expected to yield all sorts of artifacts and give historians and archaeologists a detailed view of what is a fairly famous ship in the history of Sweden.
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The Books are Taking Over... 