The Internet has made it too easy to be a quack. In my desk drawer at work, I have a wonderful collection of old UFO nuttiness from the early 1990s. It’s wonderful stuff – wildly imaginative zines full of poor writing, even poorer graphical presentation and absolutely wonderfully muddy thinking. Back in the day, you …
if you please, for the 32 journalists who died this year serving you in Iraq: Violence in Iraq claimed the lives of 32 journalists in 2006, the deadliest year for the press in a single country that the Committee to Protect Journalists has ever recorded. In most cases, such as the killing of Atwar Bahjat, …
From today’s Zippy (link will point to a different comic after 12/19/2006): Griffy: It isn’t what you say, Zippy. It’s how you say it. Zippy: Noam Chomsky! Noam Chomsky! Noam Chomsky!
Benny and his posse showed up in force today on the Journal letters page, defending the humble bicycle: Pete Vera feels as though cyclists should not be allowed on the roads because much of the money used to construct and maintain them come from car-related fees and taxes. He needs to be reminded that cars …
Nora told me what turns out to be a very old geekjoke yesterday, about how the only legitimate use of an HTML blink tag is as follows: Schroedinger’s cat is not dead. Unfortunately, (well, fortunately for you, dear readers, but unfortunately for the joke) WordPress won’t let me add a blink tag to the not, …
I don’t know southern New Mexico water issues, so I’ll offer up this Las Cruces Sun-News story without comment, except to suggest that the issue is worth following: Local conservation groups are balking at the idea that the Gila and San Francisco rivers could be used to supply water to Doña Ana County as part …
A crystalline example of why I love the science beat: “This sounds corny, but I had this feeling— ‘Wow. I’m the first human being to ever see this.’ ”
A record year for wildfires in the U.S.: Drought and hot conditions contributed to the record wildfire season, with more than 9.5 million acres burned through early December, according to the National Interagency Fire Center. The annual climate report, released Thursday by the National Climatic Data Center, says 2006 will most likely be the third …
Most readers of this blog already know what a dork Michael Crichton is. If you had any doubt, check this out – the account of how, in his latest novel, Crichton turned one of his critics into a child molester.
Steve Lohr has a nice piece in today’s New York Times about the economics of carbon mitigation, pointing out how some in carbon emitting industries actually welcome a carbon tax or cap-and-trade system: So it is something of a surprise that James E. Rogers, chief executive of Duke Energy, a coal-burning utility in the Midwest …