Get this book that I have a chapter in!

Karen Stollznow has edited this book: Would You Believe It?: Mysterious Tales From People You’d Least Expect, and you will find my chapter on page 112. This is a great idea for a book. Suppose Susan Blackmore told you she had an out of body experience? Or that Don Prothero had an alien abduction story…

source http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2017/02/28/get-this-book-that-i-have-a-chapter-in/

The best video of the Oscar Envelope screw up!

This is much better than the one you’ve already seen.

source http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2017/02/27/the-best-video-of-the-oscar-envelope-screw-up/

Resist Protest Event in Minnesota Draws Huge Crowd, Ignored By Press

Last night, I went to an event, apparently organized by an indivisible group, in Plymouth Mass. Plymouth is in Minnesota’s 3rd Congressional District, and is represented by Congressman Erik Paulsen. Paulsen took over, years ago, from a “reasonable Republican” that even Democrats in CD03 remember fondly. But Paulsen has quietly and without fanfare served as…

source http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2017/02/24/resist-protest-event-in-minnesota-draws-huge-crowd-ignored-by-press/

Ellison vs. Perez

Which one are you for? I’ll take either. At first I didn’t want Ellison to leave MN05, but if he does, and he should if he is DNC chair, we have some excellent replacements lined up, and since MN05 is the most left leaning congressional district in the country, we don’t have to worry about…

source http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2017/02/23/ellison-vs-perez/

Ben Santer on Seth Myers

Via Media Matters of America. Very interesting segment. Santer talks about what is is like to be a rogue scientist in a Donald Trump administration. The words referred to here the twelve words, were part of the 1995 Second Assessment report of the IPCC. That report is regularly updated, and forms the scientific and policy…

source http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2017/02/23/ben-santer-on-seth-myers/

Earth like exoplanet story telling

As more and more exoplanets (at first) and earth-like exoplanets (eventually) have been discovered, the way thy are described to us has become increasingly sophisticated. Below are embeds of diverse video descriptions that have been very quickly developed and distributed given the freshness of this latest scientific discovery. Note that the practice of very clearly…

source http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2017/02/23/earth-like-exoplanet-story-telling/

Cannibalism by Bill Schutt

Biologist and author Bill Schutt has a new book out: Cannibalism: A perfectly natural history. He and I talked about cannibalism on Ikonokast: Click here to check it out! It is was a fun interview, and Bill’s book is excellent. See also: You Come From Cannibals Among Cannibals Cannibal, Native, Indigenous On Cannibalism and Jameson…

source http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2017/02/21/cannibalism-by-bill-schutt/

H.R. McMaster is New NSA

Going from Flynn to McMaster feels like going from Beetle Bailey to Jack Ryan. But I don’t know much about him. He is, importantly, full of degrees and the author of Dereliction of Duty: Johnson, McNamara, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the Lies That Led to Vietnam, based on his PhD thesis. How do…

source http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2017/02/20/h-r-mcmaster-is-new-nsa/

More Classic Dystopian Fiction

Animal farm: A Fairy Story “All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.” A farm is taken over by its overworked, mistreated animals. With flaming idealism and stirring slogans, they set out to create a paradise of progress, justice, and equality. Thus the stage is set for one of the most…

source http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2017/02/18/more-classic-dystopian-fiction/

1984, the novel

1984 “The Party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command.” Winston Smith toes the Party line, rewriting history to satisfy the demands of the Ministry of Truth. With each lie he writes, Winston grows to hate the Party that seeks power for its own…

source http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2017/02/17/1984-the-novel/

What did the President know, and when did he Know it?

Below is a nice video from Move On Dot Org, as well as a link to a petition of theirs. I would like to take this opportunity to caution everyone who is trying to figure out what is going on in the White House to avoid being misled by confusion, ignorance, or intentional misdirection. I…

source http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2017/02/16/what-did-the-president-know-and-when-did-he-know-it/

Stand Up for Science Gathering in Boston

This is not the April 22 March for Science, but something more local and timed to occur with the American Association for the Advancement of Science meetings in Boston. From the press release: Scientists Take to the Streets to “Stand up for Science” Scientists and impacted communities respond to attacks by anti-science forces and climate…

source http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2017/02/16/stand-up-for-science-gathering-in-boston/

Huxley’s Brave New World

No, not that Huxley, the other Huxley. No, not that one either, the OTHER Huxley. OK, yeah, this one: Brave New World Aldous Huxley’s profoundly important classic of world literature, Brave New World is a searching vision of an unequal, technologically-advanced future where humans are genetically bred, socially indoctrinated, and pharmaceutically anesthetized to passively uphold…

source http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2017/02/16/huxleys-brave-new-world/

Mark Seeley and Mark Kulda: Climate Change Costs You Money

A while back I reviewed “Climate Change: What Everyone Needs To Know” by Joe Romm (see my review here). In that book Romm provides useful advice to help people understand the impact of climate change on them, on various aspects of their lives. For example, many people choose to retire to a specific habitat and…

source http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2017/02/15/mark-seeley-and-mark-kulda-climate-change-costs-you-money/

Editing Out Diseases with the Help of Bioengineering

I get a lot of “infographics” and many are quite good. But this medium has become a vehicle for commercial advertising. So, some company comes up with an info graphics, maybe makes a good one, sends it around to the bloggers and such, and thier name, somewhere down there near the bottom, gets around. I…

source http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2017/02/15/editing-out-diseases-with-the-help-of-bioengineering/

Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451

Paper burns at 451 degrees Fahrenheit. So does civilization. Fahrenheit 451 Ray Bradbury’s internationally acclaimed novel Fahrenheit 451 is a masterwork of twentieth-century literature set in a bleak, dystopian future. Guy Montag is a fireman. In his world, where television rules and literature is on the brink of extinction, firemen start fires rather than put…

source http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2017/02/15/ray-bradburys-fahrenheit-451/

Hypothesis: Trump does not hurt his fellow Republicans in elections, and most Democrats don’t care.

Everybody is all upset about Trump and his Republicans, but in truth, that seems to matter little. Here in Minnesota we had a local house district open, there was a special election, and the Democrats didn’t even try to win it, apparently. So they lost it. It was probably winnable. Same with GA-06. This is…

source http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2017/02/15/hypothesis-trump-does-not-hurt-his-fellow-republicans-in-elections-and-most-democrats-dont-care/

Republican Fast Food Pusher Andrew The Putz Puzder Not In Labor

When the Senate was ask to confirm — or not — the Republican Party head Trump’s pick for National Security Advisor they failed the citizens. Eighty Eight of one hundred Senators picked the man who would eventually flee the White House in disgrace, leaving the government he swore an oath to in confusion, and weakening…

source http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2017/02/15/republican-fast-food-pusher-andrew-the-putz-puzder-not-in-labor/

The Meaning of Antebellum Politics in America vis-a-vis the Current Collapse of The Republic.

I am reading Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln by Doris Kearns Goodwin, whom you may know from her occasional and always informative appearances on various TV news shows as a ranking Presidential Historian. I started reading it because I wanted to see in some detail what was going on in American…

source http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2017/02/15/the-meaning-of-antebellum-politics-in-america-vis-a-vis-the-current-collapse-of-the-republic/

It Can’

It Can’t Happen Here is the only one of Sinclair Lewis’s later novels to match the power of Main Street, Babbitt, and Arrowsmith. A cautionary tale about the fragility of democracy, it is an alarming, eerily timeless look at how fascism could take hold in America. Written during the Great Depression, when the country was…

source http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2017/02/15/23696/

How Science Can Resist Trump

The March for Science, in April, may be a June to September romance between academia and and political activists, but prior experience in Canada suggests we are in it for the cold hard winter. A conservative government in the land of the maple leaf took wide ranging action to shut down and control science and…

source http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2017/02/11/how-science-can-resist-trump/

Where does the Trump Presidency stand a fortnight and a half in?

The most recent polling indicates that Donald Trump has a 43% approval and 53% disapproval rating. So he is not exactly loved by the American people, which is odd because he seems so lovable. And, he has told us that the American people love him. And his victory in the November election was unbelievably big…

source http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2017/02/10/where-does-the-trump-presidency-stand-a-fortnight-and-a-half-in/

El Nino Season Two?

It is like that stabby lady in the bath tub in that movie. Here, I’ll give you a more readable version of the graphic from NOAA: The chance of an the Pacific ENSO system being neutral, meaning, not adding extra heat to the atmosphere and not removing extra heat form the atmosphere, is about 50%…

source http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2017/02/07/el-nino-season-two/

Introduced Into The House: H.R.861 – To terminate the Environmental Protection Agency.

Representative Mat Gaetz (Republican, Florida) introduced HR 861, “To terminate the Environmental Protection Agency” which is said to defund and remove from existence the Environmental Protection Agency. Details are unclear, but the idea is to have states and local communities regulate their environmental pollution. The EPA centralizes research programs, policy guidance, and regulatory procedures. To…

source http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2017/02/06/introduced-into-the-house-h-r-861-to-terminate-the-environmental-protection-agency/

Natural Hazards and Risk Reduction in the Modern World

Great disasters are great stories, great moments in time, great tests of technology, humanity, society, government, and luck. Fifty years ago it was probably true to say that our understanding of great disasters was thin, not well developed because of the relative infrequency of the events, and not very useful, not knowledge that we could…

source http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2017/02/06/natural-hazards-and-risk-reduction-in-the-modern-world/

Can Stranger Things 2 be as good as Stranger Things 1?

Will the Second Season of Stranger Things be as good as, or better than, the first? I suspect not, but I don’t say this because I don’t trust the actors, the director, the writers, or the producers, to do an excellent job. I say this simply because Stranger Things 1 was a) so very good…

source http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2017/02/06/can-stranger-things-2-be-as-good-as-stranger-things-1/

Climate change is real, it is a problem, and it is getting worse

The year 2016 was messy and expensive and full of climate change enhanced weather disasters. There were, according to Jeff Masters and Bob Henson, over 30 billion dollar disasters last year. This is the fourth-largest number on record going back to 1990, said insurance broker Aon Benfield in their Annual Global Climate and Catastrophe Report…

source http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2017/02/05/climate-change-is-real-it-is-a-problem-and-it-is-getting-worse/

Latest White House Press Conference on Radical Moose Lambs

Depending on where you work, may not be work safe.

source http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2017/02/05/latest-white-house-press-conference-on-radical-moose-lambs/

How to develop a digital plan to make change

Rosa Parks wasn’t just some kid who decided to defy white authority and relinquish her seat on the bus. For one thing, she was a bit older than a kid. For another, she carried out this defiant act as part of a larger strategy to cause necessary and urgent change in the rules of society.…

source http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2017/02/04/how-to-develop-a-digital-plan-to-make-change/

It was only a matter of time before the Bat Robots found Earth

Drones are so early 20th century: That doesn’t actually look too hard to make. The only tricky part is how to attach it to the monkey.

source http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2017/02/03/it-was-only-a-matter-of-time-before-the-bat-robots-found-earth/

Is Rex Tillerson Going To Save Vladimir Kara-Murza’s Life?

The State Department has been in the state of chaos over several days, between the Trump Transition Team failing to staff up the Executive Branch, high level officers leaving on their own accord, and so on. And a mere hours ago, Oil Man Rex Tillerson has been officially sworn in as Security of State. Given…

source http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2017/02/03/is-rex-tillerson-going-to-save-vladimir-kara-murzas-life/

Chile’s Devastating Fires: Another Climate Change Story

There have been significant wildfires in Chile since November, and they continue. These are the worst fires Chile has seen in known history, and Chile has been keeping track of its history for quite a while. Are these fires climate change caused? Apparently so. Chile has had a rain deficit for well over a decade,…

source http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2017/02/02/chiles-devastating-fires-another-climate-change-story/

America is part Mexican

The Dogs Still Bark in Dutch I grew up in the old Dutch colony of New Amsterdam, now known to you as the State of New York. There, I carried out extensive archaeological and historic research, and along the way, came across that phrase, “the dogs still bark in Dutch.” It is an idea that…

source http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2017/02/02/america-is-part-mexican/

Fascism Forever Club

When was a kid, I started an organization called the Nature Conservation Club. NCC for short. It had a badge, and a membership card, was free to join, and our objective was to stop civilization from paving over all the forests. The very first member was Pete Seeger, and Arlo Guthrie promised to join too,…

source http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2017/02/02/fascism-forever-club/

US House Votes Against Clean Water, Gives Big Oil Big Gift

Congressional Republicans, voting party line, will end an important provision protecting streams and rivers from coal waste, and a requirement that oil companies report payments to Foreign Governments. The former is blatant hippie punching anti environmental evil. The latter is a fully expected out come if you elect a Russian puppet president, and appoint a…

source http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2017/02/02/us-house-votes-against-clean-water-gives-big-oil-big-gift/

How to learn Python programming

Your objective is to learn Python programming. Everybody has to learn Python. You are looking for a book that will make that easier for you. One possibility, one that I’ll recommend for most people in this situation, is Python Crash Course: A Hands-On, Project-Based Introduction to Programming. To cut to the chase, there are two…

source http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2017/02/01/how-to-learn-python-programming/

March for Science

The March for Science is scheduled to take place April 22, 2017 in DC . Hashtag #ScienceMarch Twitter account here. Web site here, though not much there yet, this was JUST announced seconds ago. Alternate logo here: To find out about other marches in your area, if you can’t get to DC, for now, look…

source http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2017/02/01/march-for-science/

Should I eat my placenta?

Well, not my placenta exactly, but … well, someone’s? Did you now that the placenta that is born out of a female primate’s body is an organ of the infant also being born? It is the first body part you lose. I use the term “primate” here because, even though all the “placental mammals” as…

source http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2017/02/01/should-i-eat-my-placenta/

Neil Gorsuch: to the right of Scalia?

Neil Gorsuch is a significant and meaningful choice for SCOTUS. The image above is not fake, it really is his Harvard Law yearbook photo. If he was a Democratic pick, that one image would end him. Since he is a Republican pick, democrats have a Big Tent instead of a spine, and Republicans have no…

source http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2017/02/01/neil-gorsuch-to-the-right-of-scalia/