My Nobody's Business co-blogger Rogier has a pretty good article up about divine delusions v.s. observable reality. It's a plea for rationality, even if faith and mysticism seem like more fun. As is often my way, I have a small quibble. Rogier and his opponent are discussing a Facebook poster's insistence that a bit of lens flare in a photo of a pyramid is actually a sign that … [Read more...] about Goddesses and Falsifiability
Science
Life at Conception
A few days ago, at the conservative Illinois Review, an unnamed author who I assume is editor Fran Eaton got excited about some basic science in a post titled "Biology Textbook Author Asserts Life Begins at Conception": When does life begin? At conception? When the fertilized egg begins to multiply cells? When the zygote embeds itself into its source of … [Read more...] about Life at Conception
It’s a Convoy!
Yesterday NASA awarded development grants to four corporations for development of human-rated space transportation systems (spaceships). Here are the big winners: $22 million went to Blue Origin, best known for its intricately detailed corporate logo (as well as its founder, Jeff Bezos of Amazon.com fame) which has a creative vertical take-off and landing system which is very … [Read more...] about It’s a Convoy!
Some Dog-Sniffing Math
In one of his posts today, New York criminal defense lawyer Scott Greenfield writes about the error rate for drug-sniffing dogs: More to the point was the dog hits simply aren't anywhere nearly as worthy of credit as courts have held. Consider whether it would be equally acceptable for a cop to flip a coin in order to establish probable cause to search. For a dog whose … [Read more...] about Some Dog-Sniffing Math
What OS Did The Matrix Use?
Now we know for sure. The Matrix was originally developed using Linux. Oh sure, it looks all loving and caring now, but plug that box into the Internet, let it read all about socialism and soon enough humanity will be hunted down in our sewer-submarines and end up plugged into Linux controlled wet squishy cocoons while we dream about hot chicks in black leather beating up cops … [Read more...] about What OS Did The Matrix Use?