NEWS FROM EARLIER IN THE YEAR 2002
This page was last updated on January 3rd, 2003.
by Dave Thomas : nmsrdaveATswcp.com (Help fight SPAM! Please replace the AT with an @ )
Attack of the CLONES...
The Washington Post/Reuters (and just about everybody else!) reported on Dec. 27th that "A company associated with a group that believes extraterrestrials created mankind claimed Friday that it had produced the first clone of a human being. The company, Clonaid, announced it had created a healthy baby girl who was a clone of the 31-year-old American woman who gave birth to her. No proof was provided for the claim. ...Clonaid is viewed skeptically by most scientists, who doubt the group's technical ability to clone a human being. A Clonaid spokeswoman said an independent expert will confirm the baby is a clone through DNA testing. Clonaid is linked to a sect called the Raelians, whose founder, Claude Vorihon,describes himself as a prophet and calls himself Rael. The group believes cloning could extend human life for hundreds of years. Cattle, mice, sheep and other animals have been cloned with mixed success. Some animals have displayed defects later in life and scientists fear the same could happen with cloned humans...."
Source: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A43512-2002Dec27.html
The Albuquerque Journal's John Fleck has posted several of the reasons that this is a really, really BAD idea on his weblog. Fleck provides a nice overall (and brief) introduction to the topic, and mentions some of the concerns, such as those of Massachusetts Institute of Technology biologist Rudy Jaenisch :"In normal development ... reprogramming has to occur. It occurs during egg maturation and sperm maturation. These are very complex processes, which takes years or months in humans. Now what happens in clones? In clones, this nucleus comes in and now has to reprogram its genome probably with minutes, at most hours, because the egg has to divide. And that's where things go wrong. Most clones die. ..."
http://www.abqjournal.com/weblogs/fleck.htm
Have the Raelians really cloned a human? Skeptics are waiting for more definitive proof. Sadly, the word is that the responsibility for this proof will go to Michael Guillen, formerly a science correspondent on ABC. Bob Park of the American Physical Society said on Dec. 27th that "There are no details on how the supposed cloning of Eve was achieved, but physicist Michael Guillen, PhD Cornell, has been selected by Clonaid to verify the claim. Guillen has just the credentials Clonaid needs. In 1997 as the science correspondent for ABC Good Morning America, Guillen did a three-part series, 'Fringe or Frontier.' Of precognition he concluded 'these guys are not flakes'; on astrology, 'I think we’re just going to have to suspend judgement'; on psychokinesis, 'you have to take it seriously' (WN 3 Oct 97). Indeed, Guillen covered everything from James Patterson’s cold fusion cell to Kirlian photographs of the human aura with the same credulity. A PhD in physics, after all, is not an inoculation against foolishness. We called ABC, but were told emphatically that their relationship with Guillen ended nearly a year ago...."
http://www.aps.org/WN/WN02/wn122702.html
This would be an inopportune time to fail to remind everyone that these same Raelians have also endorsed Intelligent Design, as reported previously in NMSR's news log.
http://www.prweb.com/releases/2002/11/prweb50443.php
Moon Hoax Redux...
CNN reported on Dec. 22nd on the latest re the alleged "Hoaxed Moon Landings." CNN asks "Is that the moon or a studio in the Nevada desert? How can the flag flutter when there's no wind on the moon? Why can't we see stars in the moon-landing pictures? For three decades, NASA has taken the high road, ignoring those who claimed the Apollo moon landings were faked and part of a colossal government conspiracy. ... a few months ago, the space agency budgeted $15,000 to hire a former rocket scientist and author to produce a small book refuting the disbelievers' claims. It would be written primarily with teachers and students in mind. The idea backfired, however, embarrassing the space agency for responding to ignorance, and the book deal was chucked. 'The issue of trying to do a targeted response to this is just lending credibility to something that is, on its face, asinine,' NASA chief Sean O'Keefe said in late November after the dust settled. So it's back to square one -- ignoring the hoaxers. That's troubling to some scientific experts who contend that someone needs to lead the fight against scientific illiteracy and the growing belief in pseudoscience like aliens and astrology. Someone like NASA. 'If they don't speak out, who will?' asks Melissa Pollak, a senior analyst at the National Science Foundation. Author James Oberg will. The former space shuttle flight controller plans to write the book NASA commissioned from him even though the agency pulled the plug. He's seeking money elsewhere. His working title: 'A Pall Over Apollo.' Tom Hanks will speak out, too. ..."
Source: http://www.cnn.com/2002/TECH/space/12/22/moon.madness.ap/index.html
Survival of the Fittest... Religions, That Is...
Natalie Angier of the New York Times writes on Dec. 24th that "In a world overwhelmed by religious conflict, where no faith seems secure from the wrath of competing creeds, humanity's religious impulse can look like a decidedly mixed blessing, a source of violent intolerance as much as a prescription for upstanding and altruistic behavior. How can a force that transforms convicted murderers into placid samaritans, and that has given the world Handel's 'Messiah,' the mosaics of Ravenna and Borobudur Temple also have spawned the Salem witch hunts, Osama bin Laden and columnists who snarl that America should invade Muslim countries, 'kill their leaders and convert them to Christianity'? What sort of Jekyll-and-Hydra-headed beast is this thing called religious faith? In the view of Dr. David Sloan Wilson of Binghamton University in upstate New York, a very natural and very powerful beast indeed, and one that helps explain humanity's rise to global dominance. Dr. Wilson, a renowned evolutionary biologist, proposes that religion — with all its institutional, emotional and prescriptive trappings — ranks as a kind of mega-adaptation: a trait that evolved because it conferred advantages on those who bore it. But whereas evolutionary biologists traditionally view an adaptation as the outcome of a struggle between unevenly matched individuals — say, between one polar bear with a cleanly cloaking white coat, and another with a slightly less effective form of camouflage — Dr. Wilson sees religion as the product of group selection at work. ..."
Source: http://www.nytimes.com/2002/12/24/science/social/24CONV.html
Santa Fe "Chemtrails" Speaker Goes to Durango...
The Durango Herald reported on November 19th that "Scientists and aviation officials say there is nothing dangerous about the white jet streams from aircraft that a New Mexico scientist and some Durango-area residents say are causing sickness and drought around the country. The authorities dismiss suspicions about so-called 'chemtrails,' or chemical trails, as unfounded. In interviews Monday, some atmospheric scientists and aviation officials spoke with derision about proponents of chemtrail conspiracy theories. 'I have looked at those (chemtrail) Web sites a couple of times, and they’re right up there with the UFO folks,' said Paul Newman, a physicist with the Atmospheric Chemistry and Dynamics Branch of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration near Washington, D.C. 'There’s nothing odd in what you find in those plumes, besides what you would expect out of the tail of an aircraft.' Clifford Carnicom, a geophysicist and mathematician from Santa Fe, spoke at Storehouse Baptist Church south of Durango on Saturday night. Carnicom told about 50 residents that he believes a national or global organization is placing harmful particulates in jet emissions, which he calls 'aerosol trails.' Carnicom said none of the statements refute his theory or address the evidence he presented Saturday night. Carnicom presented videos and photographs he said showed suspicious aerosol trails that stayed suspended in the sky longer than normal. However, Charles Knight, a senior scientist at the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, said that under certain weather conditions contrails can stay suspended in the sky for days. 'These pictures of the spectacular linear clouds that these people are calling chemtrails, we simply call them contrails,' Knight said. The Federal Aviation Administration says that jet emissions are composed of carbon monoxide, nitrogen and hydrocarbon oxides and smoke. In high levels of the atmosphere, including the skies over Durango, these jet emissions easily produce ice crystals, he said....The FAA measures and regulates jet emissions to ensure they comply with the Clean Air Act of 1970, which regulates the emissions of pollutants from aircraft to ensure they meet government safety standards. Brian Toon of the University of Colorado at Boulder’s Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics said jets fly too high above the ground to drop harmful particulates on a specific target, as many chemtrail theorists believe. He, too, called contrails harmless. 'If you are afraid of contrails, I would recommend you never open your freezer, because there’s ice in your freezer and that’s what’s in contrails,' Toon said. Allen Kenitzer, a spokesman for the FAA, said the agency has never found any evidence that harmful substances are being added to contrails. 'We don’t have an official position on this, because we don’t feel we need to have one,' Kenitzer said from Seattle. 'A couple of years ago we were getting swamped with calls about this. All of these reports turned out to be nothing.' ..."
Carnicom's Website (http://www.carnicom.com/contrails.htm) has copious comments about the treacherous Durango Herald, but I had to go to Google to see what the Herald actually said. However, you can see the Herald's editorial cartoon on the "trails" at Carnicom's site:
http://www.carnicom.com/reynolds1.htm
As for me, I'm still waiting for a chemtrail enthusiast to explain to me the practicality of "dusting" at 35,000 fett up...
Electric Pickles - the "Weird Science" of Christmas...
In my never-ending quest for weird science news, I decided to see what resulted from searching for "weird science" on Google's new News Search engine. And this is what I found:
The Wichita Eagle reported on Dec. 24 2002 on odd Christmas traditions. The Eagle noted that "then there's that Gherkinbaum tradition. It's sort of a combination of an old German tradition about pickle-shaped ornaments for the Tannenbaum, combined with weird science that says a dill pickle plugged into a wall outlet will glow like a 40-watt light bulb. Gerald Graves decided to try the science for himself, using an old electric cord, some nails and a jar of gherkins. It worked. A few years later, the novelty had worn off, so he went back to the workshop to decorate the pickle like a Christmas tree. 'That was about 15 years ago. The modern Gherkinbaum sits atop a base of Styrofoam snow, surrounded by tiny presents, and is topped with a Christmas star. ... With myself wearing a lab coat, safety glasses and a Santa hat while performing the lighting ceremony, it has become a staple' of Christmas celebrations...."
Source: http://www.kansas.com/mld/kansas/living/4803766.htm
Not too shabby!
HAVE A GREAT NEW YEAR!!
Weinberg on Wolfram...
Nobel laureate and physicist Steven Weinberg reviews "A New Kind of Science" by Stephen Wolfram in the Oct. 24th New York Times Review of Books. Weinberg writes "Usually I put books that make claims like these on the crackpot shelf of my office bookcase. In the case of Wolfram's book, that would be a mistake. Wolfram is smart, winner of a MacArthur Fellowship at age twenty-two, and the progenitor of the invaluable Mathematica, and he has lots of stimulating things to say about computers and science. I don't think that his book comes close to meeting his goals or justifying his claims, but if it is a failure it is an interesting one. ..."
Source: http://www.nybooks.com/articles/15762
Penn and Teller go after Aliens and Creationists on TV...
PRNewswire reported on Dec. 16th that "On January 24 at 11:00 PM ET/PT SHOWTIME will present the controversial new series PENN & TELLER: BULLSHIT! Master showmen Penn & Teller promise an aggressive, irreverent expose of taboo topics using the duo's trademark humor, knowledge of carnival tricks and con-artistry, as well as hidden cameras and blatant confrontation. ... Using undercover operatives, scrupulous research and a healthy dose of skepticism, the Vegas headliners and world-famous magicians blow the lid off popular notions about alien abductions, Ouija boards and end of the world predictions. They expose the bogus science behind such widely accepted canards as creationism, the purity of bottled water,global warming, miracle-workers and religious cults...."
Source: http://www.prnewswire.com/cgi-bin/stories.pl?ACCT=104&STORY=/www/story/12-16-2002/0001858955&EDATE=
Florida Prosecutor drops case against "Dr. Dino" ...
Escambia County reported on Dec. 9th that the prosecutor
in the felony assault case against Kent "Dr. Dino" Hovind, the
Marjoe-style creation evangelist, has filed a "NOLLE
PROSEQUI" motion. Translation: "An entry made on the
record, by which the prosecutor or plaintiff declares that he will
proceed no further." Charges on the battery and burglary charges
were nolle prosequied also. Hovind's web site is
http://www.drdino.com
Source: http://205.152.130.14/cv_web_1b.asp?ucase_id=12619523
Echinacea for Colds? How about a Sugar Pill instead?...
YAHOO reported on Dec. 16th that "People looking to shorten a bout with the common cold or reduce their symptoms by popping capsules of echinacea (news - web sites) may not find relief, new study findings suggest. Echinacea, derived from the purple coneflower, is an herb sold over the counter as an immune-system strengthener and cold remedy. Despite a few studies that found the herb made a difference for cold sufferers, "there is no clear consensus about whether echinacea can benefit human health," lead author Dr. Bruce P. Barrett and colleagues write in the December 17th issue of the Annals of Internal Medicine...."
Abducted by Aliens? Harvard is looking for YOU...
The NY Times reported on Dec. 18th that "When Susan Clancy, a psychologist at Harvard University, wanted to study people with memories of events that had never happened, she cast her net wide. So wide it reached galaxies far, far away. Have you ever been 'contacted or abducted by space aliens?' the newspaper ads she ran read. Researchers at Harvard, the ads said,were seeking subjects 'to participate in a memory study.'..."
Source: http://www.nytimes.com/2002/12/18/education/18ALIE.html
Miss Cleo gets off, Speaks her mind...
The Click10 TV station in Florida reported on Dec. 18th that "Just before Thanksgiving, fraud charges against television psychic Miss Cleo were dropped in Florida, and now Youree del Harris, the real woman behind the crystal ball, has broken her silence. On camera, Harris (pictured) told Channel 10 News that despite what prosecutors say, she is the real thing and does have psychic abilities, which she calls the 'gift of sight.' 'Everything that I said on the TV that were my words, was real,' Harris said. 'Call me now was something required by contract to say. When I'd encounter people on the street and they said,'Cleo we tried to call.' And I said, 'Don't call that number dear.'" The commercials are off the air, and the company, which produced them, Access Resource Services, has settled with the state. ..."
Source: http://www.click10.com/mia/news/stories/news-184407120021218-061212.html
San Fran to Regulate Psychics...
The San Francisco Gate reported on Dec. 20th that "The future looked cloudy for dozens of fortune-tellers and psychics in San Francisco on Thursday after legislation was proposed to require them to obtain permits, post their rates and stop tricking their clients. Under the law, the first of its kind for a major U.S. city, fortune-tellers would no longer be allowed to perform such classic curse removals as the knot in the thread, the blood in the glass, or the hair in the grapefruit. The bury-the-money trick would be outlawed, too. 'Everyone is going to think this is a little bit hokey,' said Supervisor Aaron Peskin, introducing his ordinance at the Hall of Justice. 'But it's not hokey if it's your money that's being taken,' chimed in District Attorney Terence Hallinan, who is backing the proposal. ..."
Source: http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2002/12/20/BA83837.DTL
The Guardian poo-poohs the "Bible Code" and the "Rendlesham UFO"...
Simon Hoggart of the Guardian (UK) discussed the British tabloid "The Daily Mail" on Dec. 7th , writing "But why should anyone believe what's in the Daily Mail in the first place? This week they have returned to The Bible Code, that piece of paranormal nonsense which was very ably dismantled on Thursday by my colleague Catherine Bennett. Like all similar folderol, the code assembles vast amounts of data, which is then selectively plucked to prove whatever the writer wants to prove, in this case a coming nuclear Armageddon. With a lot of time and a half-decent computer, you could without a doubt prove that Chaucer secretly forecast the story about Cherie Blair and the conman in The Canterbury Tales. It's junk. ... Yesterday the Mail returned to the grand old Rendlesham Forest UFO story of 1980. I won't bore you with the details, except to say that the whole scenario has been very adequately explained many times - a lighthouse shining through the trees, a meteor over southern England - and the marks of the alleged three-legged landing gear in the soft soil were plainly rabbit diggings. They weren't even symmetrical. To be fair the Mail includes some of these points, only to bury them in a morass of fake mystery. We're supposed to believe that space aliens crossed from another solar system in a sort of inter-galactic go-kart, then having landed, disappeared again without even leaving a note. ..."
Source: http://politics.guardian.co.uk/diary/story/0,9176,855605,00.html
Oldest Rocks on the EARTH...
The BBC reported on Dec. 5th that "The oldest volcanic rocks in the world have been discovered by geologists in Canada. The rocks date back almost four billion years and were discovered in northern Quebec. By studying the rocks the scientists hope to find out more about how life began on Earth. And by comparing these rocks with similar ones found in Greenland, the researchers can learn more about the first billion years of the planet's evolution. ... By calculating the radioactive decay in the rocks' minerals, the scientists estimated their samples to be 3.825 billion years old - give or take 16 million years. ... But the rocks just discovered are very similar to others from the so-called Isua sequence in Greenland. ... Much research has already been carried out on these basaltic rocks, and scientists believe they may have found carbon compounds in them that were produced by biological activity. The Canadian and Greenland rocks can now be looked at together. Professor Stevenson said: 'These rocks give us a comparison that wasn't there before.' ..."
Source: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/2546019.stm
Stan Miller is Back...
One of creationist Jonathan Wells's attacks on evolution is his book Icons of Evolution is the work Stanley Miller did on pre-biotic atmospheres of the ancient earth. In Wells' "Ten questions to ask your biology teacher about evolution.," his first question is "Why do textbooks claim that the 1953 Miller-Urey experiment shows how life's building blocks may have formed on the early Earth -- when conditions on the early Earth were probably nothing like those used in the experiment, and the origin of life remains a mystery?" Wells argues that the early atmosphere was not strongly reducing, and would thus have not permitted the formation of biological molecules like amino acids.
Source: http://www.iconsofevolution.com/tools/questions.php3
But Stan Miller is still at it, and his latest research on early atmospheres appears in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA, Vol. 99, Issue 23, 14628-14631, November 12, 2002. Miller notes that "Most models of the primitive atmosphere around the time life originated suggest that the atmosphere was dominated by carbon dioxide, largely based on the notion that the atmosphere was derived via volcanic outgassing, and that those gases were similar to those found in modern volcanic effluent. These models tend to downplay the possibility of a strongly reducing atmosphere, which had been thought to be important for prebiotic synthesis and thus the origin of life. However, there is no definitive geologic evidence for the oxidation state of the early atmosphere and bioorganic compounds are not efficiently synthesized from CO2 atmospheres. In the present study, it was shown that a CO-CO2-N2-H2O atmosphere can give a variety of bioorganic compounds with yields comparable to those obtained from a strongly reducing atmosphere. Atmospheres containing carbon monoxide might therefore have been conducive to prebiotic synthesis and perhaps the origin of life. CO-dominant atmospheres could have existed if the production rate of CO from impacts of extraterrestrial materials were high or if the upper mantle had been more reduced than today. ..."
Source: http://www.pnas.org/cgi/content/abstract/99/23/14628
NMSR's Wells Pages:
http://www.nmsr.org/iconanti.htm
http://www.nmsr.org/jonwells.htm
Using Genetic Engineering to Save Endangered Species...
MSN Australia reported on Dec. 8th that "Chinese scientists have cloned the giant panda's reproductive hormone gene, and hope this can help the endangered species improve its ability to breed in captivity....The cloning of the hormone gene can be used to modulate egg production and build up the panda's enthusiasm for mating, improving breeding ability, Zhang said. China has begun experiments to clone one of the black and white creatures, of which only a handful remain...."
Source: http://news.ninemsn.com.au/Sci_Tech/story_43499.asp
Another Beneficial Mutation Discovered...
The Age (Australia) reported on Dec. 9th that "Melbourne scientists have found that a genetic resistance to malaria has evolved in people from Melanesia, a discovery that is a vital step in the development of a vaccine for the disease. The malaria parasite works by invading and occupying red blood cells before bursting out and releasing a small explosion of toxin every 48 hours, causing inflammation, fever and chills. In a study reported today in the journal Nature Medicine, Alan Cowman and Alexander Maier, from the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute, concluded that a gene mutation common to Melanesians thwarts the parasite's attacks on red blood cells. 'When you have the mutation . . . the parasite cannot invade as well,' Dr Cowman said...."
Source: http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2002/12/08/1038950272166.html
Another METEOR SHOWER this weekend...
YAHOO reported on Dec. 6th that "Less than a month after the Leonid meteor shower, another excellent display is just around the corner. The reliable, annual Geminid meteor shower is scheduled to reach its peak during the pre-dawn hours of Saturday, Dec. 14. The Geminids should produce a fine display of 1-2 meteor every minute for North American observers with dark skies, weather permitting. Brief bursts of activity could produce even higher rates. The nights and mornings surrounding the peak activity should prove rewarding, too. ..."
It's Been A Bad Week for Creationists, Intelligent Design Theorists...
First it was Ohio. ID supporters have been clamoring for inclusion of "Intelligent Design" in Ohio's school science standards for a year or so. The Ohio Board rewarded these efforts by tacking on a provision to the new standards specifically blocking the teaching and testing of "Intelligent Design" concepts. The Cincinatti Inquirer reported on Dec. 11th that "Greater Cincinnati science teachers say they are relieved that the Ohio State Board of Education on Tuesday did not stress teaching "intelligent design" as part of the state's new science standards. Teachers interviewed say intelligent design - the concept that changes in species are guided by a higher intelligent power - should not be taught alongside evolution in science curricula because it's not science. ... The state school board unanimously approved science standards Tuesday that take a stronger stance on evolution and allow students to critique its legitimacy. ... Under the standards, evolution will be the only life concept covered on the tests, meaning that schools that currently avoid teaching evolution or only briefly cover the theory would risk putting their students at a disadvantage. ... The new science standards emphasize evolution but allow critical analysis of the theory. However, the board added an amendment saying the standards do not mandate the teaching or testing of intelligent design. ..."
Source: http://enquirer.com/editions/2002/12/11/loc_science11.html
And in Lousiana, ID supporters wanted that state to adopt an "Evolution is Just a Theory" disclaimer like the one in Alabama (and a little like the one used in New Mexico in the 1970's; see http://www.nmsr.org/nmevhist.htm for the details). Their efforts were not successful. The Advocate News reported on Dec. 13th that "The state's top school board rejected a move Thursday to add a disclaimer to high school biology textbooks that said evolution is only a theory. The vote was 7-3. A committee of the board endorsed the disclaimer Tuesday, modeled after one adopted in Alabama. Louisiana and Alabama would have been the only two states with such a provision if the plan had won approval. ..."
Source: http://www.theadvocate.com/stories/121302/new_rejects001.shtml
It's Ba-a-ack! The Bible Code II...
\Michael Drosnin's sequel to the Bible Code, called the Bible Code II, was released in November 2002. The new book is all about the portents of the September 11th terror attacks Drosnin has since found "encoded" in Torah. Amazon.com has kindly placed an excerpt from the new book on the internet. I applied the "Bible Code" technique to this excerpt (a mere 6,966 characters, for 1,617 words), and found this AMAZING secret message, encoded in Drosnin's very own words:
This entire (and rather large) puzzle can be seen on the web, at http://www.nmsr.org/biblecod.htm, along with further commentary.
Scientists will get to study THIS new "Kennewick Man"...
Jeordan Legon of CNN wrote on December 3rd that "Researchers said it may be the oldest skull ever found in the Americas: an elongated-faced woman who died about 13,000 years ago. But perhaps more significant than the bones' age, researchers said, is that they were found while digging a well near Mexico City International Airport. Because the remains were discovered outside the United States, scientists will be able to study the DNA and structure of the skeleton without the objection of Native American groups, who can claim and rebury ancestral remains under a 1990 U.S. law. ..."
Source: http://www.cnn.com/2002/TECH/science/12/03/oldest.skull/index.html
Chris Mooney on Intelligent Design...
Here's an interesting article on creationism in the American Prospect:
http://www.prospect.org/print/V13/22/mooney-c.html
Of Mice and Men: Genetic Code Secrets Revealed...
NewScientist.com news service reported on Dec. 2nd that "The first high quality draft of the mouse genome has been greeted by geneticists as a `Rosetta stone' that will help unravel the secrets of our own genes. With 99 per cent of our DNA now confirmed to match that of Mus musculus, geneticists can find out how human genes work with experiments on their favourite lab animal. ... `For the first time we have an opportunity to see ourselves in an evolutionary mirror,' says Eric Lander, director of the Whitehead/MIT Center for Genome Research in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Studies comparing the mouse and human sequences that accompany the mouse genome in the journal Nature suggest it provides plenty of new leads in biology and disease. ... One new puzzle that will have biologists scratching their heads for years to come is the function of mysterious "non-coding" chunks of DNA. These are not genes but must have an important role because evolution has left them virtually unchanged in both humans and mice since our evolutionary paths parted about 75 million years ago. ..."
Source: http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns99993147
Governor Richardson Meets Roswell...
Steve Terrell of the Santa Fe New Mexican said this on Nov. 28th about the Sci Fi channel's "Roswell: Smoking Gun" documentary: "Stranger than (science) fiction: Last week the Sci-Fi channel ran a special documentary about the celebrated Roswell UFO incident - the alleged flying saucer crash in 1947. Among those interviewed by Bryant Gumbel was our own Bill Richardson. What was surprising about the interview was the fact that Gumbel referred to Richardson as the governor of New Mexico. The way we understand it, even though he's got a temporary office on the fourth floor of the Roundhouse and just about everyone is calling him `governor,' Richardson doesn't get sworn in until Jan. 1. Was Gumbel merely mistaken? Or does he possess the secret of time travel? Although reopening the Roswell case was one of the few campaign promises he didn't make, Richardson - or was it the future Richardson? - told Gumbel he does not believe all the truth about the Roswell incident has come out. ..."
Source: http://santafenewmexican.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=6216170&BRD=2144&PAG=461&dept_id=367954&rfi=6
Bigfoot is Dead at 84...
Scott Martelle of the Los Angeles Times writes on Dec. 6th that "There wasn't enough room in Ray Wallace's grave for him and his hoax, so now the truth is out: Bigfoot didn't exist. Or at least not the Bigfoot that Wallace helped make famous. Wallace, a former logger, converted the imaginary into celebrity in 1958 when news reports surfaced about large, mysterious footprints found in a logging camp where Wallace worked in Bluff Creek, part of Humboldt County in Northern California. Then Wallace began milking it. He reported Bigfoot sightings. He recorded Bigfoot sounds. He played the faithful like a violin and giggled behind his hand the whole time, said son Michael Wallace. `He was a prankster, but never malicious,' the son said Thursday. `He just liked playing jokes.'... `He made a lot of people laugh,' Wallace said. `It was a fun family to grow up in.' Serious students of Bigfoot long suspected Wallace was faking it, so the family's admission wasn't much of a surprise and does not discredit what they see as other evidence that Bigfoot exists. ..."
Source: http://news.mywebpal.com/partners/575/public/news403259.html
This is BIG: Neutrinos have Mass...
We don't yet know what the miniscule neutrino's mass is, but we now know that it's non-zero, thanks to measurements of differences between oscillating neutrinos. Here's the report from Science Blog posted on Dec. 6th: "Results from the first six months of experiments at KamLAND, an underground neutrino detector in central Japan, show that anti-neutrinos emanating from nearby nuclear reactors are `disappearing,' which indicates they have mass and can oscillate or change from one type to another. As anti-neutrinos are the anti-matter counterpart to neutrinos, these results provide independent confirmation of earlier studies involving solar neutrinos and show that the Standard Model of Particle Physics, which has successfully explained fundamental physics since the 1970's, is in need of updating. The results also point the way to the first direct measurements of the total radioactivity of the earth. ..."
Source: http://www.scienceblog.com/community/article530.html
Dogs...Out of Asia?
The New York Times reported on Nov. 22nd on new studies indicating that virtually all dogs, even pre-Columbian dogs from North America (since vanished, and accessible only via ancient remains), descended from a few lines of wolves from east Asia. Nicholas Wade writes "Dr. Wayne and another colleague, Dr. Jennifer Leonard, analyzed the DNA of New World dogs, expecting to find that they had been domesticated by American Indians from local wolves. To exclude dogs brought from Europe, Dr. Leonard gathered pre-Columbian dog bones from archaeological sites and extracted their DNA. The samples matched that of Eurasian dogs, not American wolves, showing that dogs, of at least five lineages, must have been brought from the Old World to the New by pre-Columbian settlers. ..."
Source: http://www.nytimes.com/2002/11/22/science/22DOGS.html
Intermittent Island Re-surfacing, International Wrangling Resumes...
ABC News reported on Nov. 25th that "A volcanic island submerged off the coast of Sicily for the last 170 years could reappear in the coming weeks if furious seismic rumblings continue, Italy's chief seismologist said Monday. ... Formed by the tip of a submerged volcano, the island last popped up in 1831, sparking a diplomatic spat among several nations, before it sank beneath the Mediterranean waves six months later. ... Over the centuries, the island has emerged four times, with underwater volcanic eruptions first recorded during the first Punic War of 264-241 BC. The last emergence on July 2, 1831, caused months of international wrangling with four nations making territorial claims including Britain, Spain and the Bourbon court of Sicily. ... "
Source: http://abcnews.go.com/wire/SciTech/reuters20021125_196.html
Roses are Red, Violets are Blue, Tinker DNA, Get Blue Roses Too?
MSNBC reported on Nov. 25th that "Breakthroughs in biotechnology may finally resolve the quest for the elusive blue rose, which alas does not exist because roses lack the corresponding pigment genes.Technology also promises to restore sweet smells to the rose and other flowers. Generations of commercial breeding has led to beautiful but bland-smelling roses. Their colors are stunning and vase lives long, but they’ve little fragrance.Genetic engineers are also busy bringing science to bear on diseases and pests that affect the world’s 120 different rose species, which have blossomed into a $10 billion-a-year business worldwide. Still, it’s the blue rose that remains the biggest prize. ..."
Source: http://www.msnbc.com/news/838646.asp
Bilirubin, cause of the "Yellow" in Jaundice, May Be Beneficial...
Newsday reported on Nov. 26th that "The molecule responsible for turning some newborn skin the color of bright yellow autumn leaves - a signal of jaundice - may have a benefit after all. Scientists have shown that the bilirubin molecule is a potent antioxidant that could one day be harnessed as a treatment for cardiovascular disease and other conditions caused by cell damage, according to scientists at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine in Baltimore. Oxidative stress is a major cause of cell injury and death, and substances that block this destructive process are called antioxidants. 'This is a very powerful antioxidant,' said Dr. Solomon Snyder, director of neuroscience at Hopkins and a co-author of the bilirubin study published yesterday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. ..."
Source: http://www.newsday.com/news/health/ny-hsbili263020112nov26,0,4235592.story?coll=ny-health-headlines
Elisabeth Targ, M. D., studied Prayer and Healing, but the Prayers of her Admirers couldn't prevent her death from a Brain Tumor...
Po Bronson of Wired.com reported in the December 2002 issue on the recent death of Elisabeth Targ. Targ had studued the effects of prayer on healin in the late 90's, and her controversial study, published in the Western Journal of Medicine, "showed that the subjects who were not prayed for spent 600 percent more days in the hospital. They contracted 300 percent as many AIDS-related illnesses. That's a pretty sensationalistic way of saying those who were prayed for were a lot less sick. Here's the somewhat less-sensational way of framing the results: The control group spent a total of 68 days in the hospital receiving treatment for 35 AIDS-related illnesses. The treatment group spent only 10 days in the hospital for a mere 13 illnesses...." When Targ herself developed a brain tumor, "Her bedroom turned into a circus. Healers from everywhere showed up wanting to help. It was rarely peaceful and quiet. There was Phillip Scott, a Lakota sun dancer who burned sage; Nicolai Levashov, a Russian psychic who waved his hands; Harriet Bienfield, an acupuncturist with rare Chinese herbs; Desda Zuckerman, an energy worker who used techniques inspired by the ancient methods of the Miwok peoples. The reverend Rosalyn Bruyere phoned often, trying to get on Targ's schedule. And, of course, there was her father, Russell, urging her to meditate, calm her mind, go to that place. ..." The prayers didn't prolong Targ's life, and she died two weeks before her 41st birthday. Bronson's article also looks back at flaws in Targ's celebrated study. "...her study had been unblinded and then 'reblinded' to scour for data that confirmed the thesis - and the Western Journal of Medicine did not know this fact when it decided to publish. Her famous study was not, as its reputation suggests, designed to measure the number of AIDS-related illnesses. Targ and Fred Sicher had targeted their study to measure mortality but were caught off-guard by triple-drug anti-retroviral therapy, which became common practice one month into the six-month trial. When biostatistician Dan Moore broke the randomization code to unblind the data, it told them nothing - since only one patient had died, the data was meaningless. ..."
Source: http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/10.12/prayer_pr.html
Evolution: Predictable, Reproducible...
The NSF reported on Nov. 15th that "NSF-supported researchers at the University of California at San Diego have created a computer model that accurately predicts how E. coli metabolic systems adapt and evolve when the bacteria are placed under environmental constraints. Bernhard Palsson, Rafael Ibarra (now at GenVault Corporation in Carlsbad, California) and Jeremy Edwards (now at the University of Delaware at Newark) report their findings in the November 14 issue of Nature. ..."
Source: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2002/11/021115065518.htm
Noah's Ark Spotted?
Space.com reported on Nov. 19th that "Satellite sleuth Porcher Taylor has his fingers crossed. Later this week, the government is set to release oodles of old Keyhole spysat imagery. In the batch may be KH-9 imagery taken in 1973 showing what Taylor calls the "Ararat Anomaly" in Turkey - perhaps the remains of Noah's Ark, or just a very strange rock outcropping. ..."
Source: http://www.space.com/news/astronotes-1.html
Black Hole Duet Dazzles...
The Miami Herald reported on Nov. 19th that "For the first time, astronomers have discovered a nearby galaxy with not one but two enormous black holes gobbling up stars. Eventually, they say, these monstrous objects will collide, unleashing a tidal wave of radiation and shaking the very fabric of space. ... The black holes are rapidly spiraling around each other, drawing closer and closer, and will collapse into a single supermassive object in several hundred million years ... The collision will create ripples in space, known as gravitational waves, that will spread across the universe, Centrella said. She compared the effect to the motion of leaves floating on a pond when a stone is dropped in. Because of the great distance, the effects of the cosmic smashup won't be felt in our neighborhood for more than half a billion years. When the ripples reach Earth, they will be so faint that only extremely sensitive instruments can detect them. ..."
Source: http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/4557407.htm
"Raptor" Parts Identified...
National Geographic News reported on November 20 "The principal part of a famously fabricated dinosaur fossil is an ancient fish-eating bird, scientists report. The Archaeoraptor fossil was introduced in 1999 and hailed as the missing evolutionary link between carnivorous dinosaurs and modern birds. It was fairly quickly exposed as bogus, a composite containing the head and body of a primitive bird and the tail and hind limbs of a dromaeosaur dinosaur, glued together by a Chinese farmer. Initial CT scans suggested that the fossil might have been made up of anywhere from two to five specimens of two or more species. Chinese and American scientists now report that the fabricated fossil is made up of two species...."
Source: http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2002/11/1120_021120_raptor.html
Formation of Feathers? Molecular Details Are Confirmed...
Nature reported on Nov. 21st about a new "developmental approach to analyse molecular mechanisms in feather-branching morphogenesis." The abstract notes that "Our analyses identify the molecular pathways underlying the topological transformation of feathers from cylindrical epithelia to the hierarchical branched structures, and provide insights on the possible developmental mechanisms in the evolution of feather forms. ..."
Source: http://www.nature.com/nlink/v420/n6913/abs/nature01196_fs.html
Raelians Annouce Support for ID...
The Raelian Movement announced on Nov. 15th that "The Raelian Movement supports the Intelligent Design Movement and their attempt to promote the teaching of ID theory within science classes. For the past 29 years, the International Raelian Movement has been actively involved in spreading the revolutionary idea that life originated from an Extraterrestrial intelligence. Not God, not evolution, but a 3rd and much more plausible theory. Indeed, since RAEL's physical encounter with the Elohim (extraterrestrial humans from another planet - see www.rael.org) in 1973, he has been traveling the world trying to educate people about the clear and concise message that he received from this civilization. More and more scientists are supporting this theory.....29 years later...."
Source: http://www.prweb.com/releases/2002/11/prweb50443.php
Stalin - Roswell was a UFO...
Pravda reported on Nov. 19th that "Almost simultaneously with the USA, in the middle of the 20th century, the USSR tabooed everything connected with UFO crashes. Immediately, the next day after one of the first UFO crashes, in Roswell (the state of New Mexico, U.S.A.), on June 2, 1947, General Roger Romay [sic], commander of the 8th American Air Brigade, declared that the incident was a mere crash of a weather balloon. That was the very beginning of a campaign of mass disinformation. Your average American citizen believed the general’s statement for several dozens of years, as they considered it really incredible that an UFO might really have crashed. However, the Soviet leadership headed by Joseph Stalin didn’t believe Romay’s lies at all. The USSR believed that the story about a weather balloon crashing was just an attempt to hide the truth. ...In 1948, on Stalin’s order, the first sample of an UFO was brought to the Moscow region. Famous Soviet archeologist and artist and journalist Sukhoveyev described the events that preceded this event. ... Archeologist Khvoika told himself that the 'discovered ancient space rocket' was a sign of an ancient civilization. ..."
Source: http://english.pravda.ru/main/2002/11/19/39641.html
Sci Fi Roswell Special ... Much Ado About Nothing?
In the end, the Sci Fi channel's much bally-hooed "Smoking Gun" in the Nov. 22nd airng of "The Roswell Crash: Startling New Evidence" relied not at all on on the UNM archaeologists who excavated the Roswell "crash site." No, the "big surprises" found by the UNM team included merely a ten-year old weather balloon, an old furrow that aerial photographs show was already there by 1946, and a second "furrow" that might turn out to be a simple gopher hole. John Fleck of the Albuquerque Journal wrote on Nov. 23rd that "It might be a furrow in the earth from the crash of an alien spacecraft. Or it might be a coyote burrow. The strange furrow and some bags of dirt locked away for further study are all the SCI FI Channel has to show for 10 days of excavation at one of the most bizarre sites in American archaeology. ...The most dramatic 'smoking gun' in Friday's show came in the form of a piece of paper in an Army officer's hand in a 1947 photo. A UFO researcher, David Rudiak, claims a computer enhancement of the photo allowed him to read about 'victims' and a crashed disk in the old memo. Critics say Rudiak's analysis, published first on the Internet at least a year ago, is little more than fuzzy blobs in the blown-up images interpreted to suit his preconceived notions about Roswell. 'It's totally subjective,' said Dave Thomas, a Peralta physicist and longtime Roswell crash skeptic. 'The 'smoking gun' is just suggestive wishful thinking.' ..."
Source: http://www.abqjournal.com/scitech/801797scitech11-23-02.htm
You can browse Rudiak's phuzzy photo's here:
http://www.roswellproof.homestead.com/index.html
And read UFO author Kevin Randle's analysis here:
http://www.virtuallystrange.net/ufo/updates/2002/jun/m17-015.shtml
Randle's conclusion: "Jim Houran, at the School of Medicine at Southern Illinois University and I conducted an experiment to find out how much of the memo can be read and how much of what people see in the memo is the result of priming (that is, having already heard what is in the memo, they see those same things). The results of the experiment have been published in the Journal of Scientific Exploration. Interestingly, not one of the people saw the word 'victims' in the memo. There was agreement on many of the words such as Fort Worth, Texas, and balloons. But no one saw victims and we were careful not to set up a situation so that the subjects knew what we were wanting. What we did find was that the interpretation of the message was based, in part, on the conditions in which it was given to the subjects. Most interesting was that those who were told that the message was related to atomic testing found other words in the message such as flash. Their interpretation was consistent with what they believed about the context of the message. ... The real point here, however, is that the word 'Victims' is not clearly legible to those who have not been told that it appears in the memo, or told where to look. - KRandle"
Evolution in Motor City...
The Detroit Free Press reported on Nov. 12th, 2002 that "A 40-year-old Detroit area woman had endured painfully infected foot sores for more than a year. Doctors gave her numerous antibiotics, but nothing worked. Finally, last April, they amputated one of her toes -- and made a frightening discovery. Her sores were infected with a virulent new strain of the bacterium staphylococcus aureus, or staph aureus. By stealing genetic material from another bug, the new strain became totally resistant to vancomycin, the longtime drug of last defense against it. ... The infection was the first of its kind in the world and a landmark defeat for doctors and public health officials in the fight against growing antibiotic resistance. It also was evidence that the Detroit area has become an incubator for resistant strains. ..."
Source: http://www.freep.com/news/health/nstaph12_20021112.htm
Miss Cleo says "Goodbye" to Ill-Gotten $500,000,000...
ABC News reported on Nov. 14th that "The operators of Miss Cleo's psychic hot line agreed Thursday to cancel $500 million in customer bills to settle federal charges that the service fleeced callers while promising mystical insights into love and money. The settlement requires Access Resource Services Inc. and Psychic Readers Network Inc. to stop using pay-per-call numbers to sell their soothsaying services, the Federal Trade Commission said. The two Fort Lauderdale, Fla.-based companies, which promoted a national network of 'psychic readers' on television and the Internet, also must pay the FTC a $5 million fine. 'I'm no psychic but I can foresee this: If you make deceptive claims, there is an FTC action in your future,' said Howard Beales, director of the FTC's consumer protection bureau. ..."
Source: http://abcnews.go.com/wire/US/ap20021114_1275.html
Roswell meets UNM meets Bryant Gumbel...
The Sci Fi channel announced on Nov. 8th that "At 8 p.m., Bryant Gumbel hosts The Roswell Crash: Startling New Evidence, a two-hour documentary about the 1947 event that includes new eyewitness interviews and never-before-seen footage. The documentary includes an excavation of the alleged Roswell crash site by archaeologists from the University of New Mexico in partnership with SCI FI. ..."
Source: http://www.scifi.com/scifiwire/art-main.html?2002-11/08/11.00.sfc
Dembski Debates Orr...
The October/November 2002 issue of Boston Review featured a debate between ID theorist William Dembski and biologist H. Allen Orr. Orr's conclusion: "Dembski, Behe and associates may in the end prove a thorn in the side of not only biologists but also the devout. By promising devastating objections to evolution but delivering half-baked technobabble that disintegrates upon close inspection, they subject certain religious persons to unnecessary and traumatic cycles of expectation and dashed hope. ..."
Source: http://bostonreview.mit.edu/BR27.5/exchange.html
Anti-Evolutionist Tom Delay to be House Majority Leader...
ABC News reported on Nov.13th that "Soon to take over the House majority leader's office, Republican Tom DeLay is moving up to a position where his hard-nosed, take-no-hostages approach to politics may not fit his job title. ...Back home in Texas last April, DeLay drew some criticism for advising an audience in a speech at a Baptist Church not to send their children to Baylor or Texas A&M. A spokesman said the advice pertained to parents who want children to be taught creationism. It was later revealed that DeLay had been kicked out of Baylor for his own college behavior. DeLay, who earned his degree in biology from the University of Houston in 1970, remains popular in his Houston suburban district, winning 63 percent of the vote in last week's election. 'In some parts of the country, including my own, it is not a pleaser that the guy who is running the House of Representatives doesn't believe in evolution,' said Rep. Zoe Lofgren, D-Calif. 'He has run this House for quite some time. He selected the speaker and he calls the shots and having that known in the country is a good thing.'..."
Source: http://abcnews.go.com/wire/Politics/ap20021113_582.html
Scientists: Turin Shroud IS Medieval After All...
The Discovery Channel reported on Nov. 15th that "... in April this year, a pair of scientists, Anatoliy Fesenko, a forensic expert at the Russian Federal Security Service, and Alexander Belyakov, director of the Russian Center for the Turin Shroud, said the 1988 study had been skewed. They pointed to evidence that in the 16th century, the Shroud had been wiped with fresh vegetable oil — olive oil, linseed oil or nut oil — in order to remove surface grime. This, they contended, had left traces of oil in the fabric that had distorted the carbon dating, making the relic younger by some 1,300 years. But, according to another Russian team, Fesenko and Belyakov got their calculations wrong. The pair did not account for different ratios between two isotopes, carbon 14 and carbon 12, in the vegetable oil, according to the new study. As a result, this meant that the oil contamination would only change the 1260-1390 timeframe very marginally, by four decades at the most. The new research is published by Dmitry Voronov from the Institute for Problems of Information Transfer at the Russian Academy of Sciences and Vladimir Surdin from the Shternberg State Astronomy Institute. ..."
Source: http://dsc.discovery.com/news/afp/20021111/shroud.html
Surprise! Mickey Mouse is Medieval Too!
The BBC reported on Nov. 15th that "A 700-year-old fresco bearing an uncanny resemblance to Walt Disney's Mickey Mouse has been discovered in Austria. The mouse figure was unearthed by an art historian working on the church in the southern village of Malta. The figure bears an enormous resemblance to Walt Disney's famous mouse... It has the same upturned nose and large, rounded ears. ... Historians say the creature may in fact be a weasel, which in medieval times was believed to give birth through its ears. ..."
Source: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/2481749.stm
Click here to see an image of the fresco :
http://news.bbc.co.uk/nol/shared/spl/hi/entertainment/02/austrian_mouse/img/mouse150.jpg
Harry Potter, Book-Burners Return...
It's almost winter, and that means that Harry Potter is returning to movie theatres, and that books about the young wizard are returning to fundamentalist bonfires. The Boston Globe reported on Nov. 15th that "in the headquarters of the Oneness Pentecostal Church, the Rev. Douglas Taylor sees the hand of the devil in the appeal of the Harry Potter books and films. A public 'book-cutting' took place at which Taylor and five other pastors tore a copy of the J. K. Rowling book, on which the film is based, to shreds last night before a clapping audience of 100 people at a local hotel. ... In Alamogordo, N.M., last year, members of the Christ Community Church sang 'Amazing Grace' as they tossed Harry Potter and other books into an outdoors fire. Jack Brock, the church's pastor, branded the books as 'a masterpiece of satanic deception.' Warner Brothers officials declined to comment, but local reaction to Taylor's book-cutting ranges from politely mixed to head-shaking incredulous. ..."
Source: http://www.boston.com/dailyglobe2/319/metro/Minister_sees_devil_in_Harry_Potter_+.shtml
Be Afraid... Be VERY Afraid...
Kim Johnson has submitted this week's Wacky Web Site candidate. This one could be the winner for the whole year!
Source: http://www.timecube.com/
Creationist Hovind lawyers up...
Barnstorming creationist Kent "Dr. Dino" Hovind has been charged with felony assault in Escambia County, Florida. He originally was defending himself, but has since gotten a lawyer, Michael Rollo. Jury selection is set for Dec. 9, 2002.
Source: http://205.152.130.14/cv_web_1b.asp?ucase_id=12619523
AAAS STATES POSITION ON ID...
From the AAAS Website: "The AAAS (American Association for the Advancement of Science) Board recently passed a resolution urging policymakers to oppose teaching "Intelligent Design Theory" within science classrooms, but rather, to keep it separate, in the same way that creationism and other religious teachings are currently handled. ... The Ohio State Education Board is inviting further public comment through November. In December, board members will vote to conclusively determine whether alternatives to evolution should be included in new guidelines that spell out what students need to know about science at different grade levels. Meanwhile, ID theorists have reportedly been active in Missouri, Kansas, New Mexico, New Jersey, and other states, as well Ohio and Georgia...."
Source: http://www.aaas.org/news/releases/2002/1106id.shtml
And from the AAAS Board Resolution itself:
"The contemporary theory of biological evolution is one of the most robust products of scientific inquiry. It is the foundation for research in many areas of biology as well as an essential element of science education. To become informed and responsible citizens in our contemporary technological world, students need to study the theories and empirical evidence central to current scientific understanding.
Over the past several years proponents of so-called "intelligent design theory," also known as ID, have challenged the accepted scientific theory of biological evolution. As part of this effort they have sought to introduce the teaching of "intelligent design theory" into the science curricula of the public schools. The movement presents "intelligent design theory" to the public as a theoretical innovation, supported by scientific evidence, that offers a more adequate explanation for the origin of the diversity of living organisms than the current scientifically accepted theory of evolution. In response to this effort, individual scientists and philosophers of science have provided substantive critiques of "intelligent design," demonstrating significant conceptual flaws in its formulation, a lack of credible scientific evidence, and misrepresentations of scientific facts. ... "
Source: http://www.aaas.org/news/releases/2002/1106id2.shtml
UNM Supporting Sci-Fi Channel's "Gee Whiz" show on New Roswell Discoveries...
In a story published on Nov. 5th, 2002, Albuquerque Journal reporter John Fleck wrote "A University of New Mexico-led team of archaeologists, working under "top secret conditions," excavated the alleged Roswell UFO crash site in September and found "something." "We found something there that totally surprised us and made me say, 'Gee whiz,' '' said Bill Doleman, the UNM archaeologist who led the dig. Was it a fragment of the alien spacecraft alleged to have crashed near Corona 55 years ago? Perhaps the bones of a little green man? To find out, mark your calendars for the evening of Nov. 22. Doleman is bound to secrecy by a contract between UNM and the television network that funded the dig. The contract even bars him from telling "non-terrestrial entities" what he found. ..."
I've seen a copy of the "Archaeological Testing And Remote Sensing Study Plan for Foster Ranch Impact Site," and it looks very discouraging. For one thing, the "Technical Advisors" for the project are Don Schmitt and Tom Carey, whom UNM Principal Investigator William Doleman called "recognized Roswell Incident researchers" in his test plan. But, Schmitt is a very poorly-regarded UFO researcher. He is the author of two Roswell books with Kevin Randle, but Randle broke off his partnership with Schmitt when he found that Schmitt had lied to him about his college degrees, about working as a medical illustrator, and about being in the witness protection program. Schmitt told Randle he was not a postman (on tape!), but it turned out he was a postman after all. Our July speaker James Moseley's Saucer Smear described Schmitt in May of 2000 as follows: "The International UFO Museum & Research Center at Roswell, New Mexico, has announced the appointment of four prominent researchers to be Advisors to their esteemed Board of Directors. They are Stanton Friedman, Linda Moulton Howe, George Fawcett and (eeek!) Donald Schmitt. With "objective" advisors like these on the loose, how can they possibly go wrong?"
Source: http://www.martiansgohome.com/smear/v47/ss000515.htm
And in July of 1999 a letter writer told Smear "I do agree with you about that pathetic 'Roswell Revival' attempt by Tom Carey & Don Schmitt. That they could be considering to examine 'rodent holes' in the desert, after half a century, is laughable. The same goes for that other equally pathetic effort - namely the so-called 'computer analysis' of the memo in General Ramey's hand in the Fort Worth photos. The Roswell diehards will never give up, and their fantasies will likely continue forever... "
Source: http://www.martiansgohome.com/smear/v46/ss990701.htm
The team looked for several things - a furrow left by the extraterrestrial craft, any debris from the craft itself, Native American artifacts, and so forth. However, they were not bothering to look for, oh, say, debris from Army Air Force physics experiments (Mogul balloon trains) thought by many non-true-believers to be the real source of the Roswell Incident.
Has definitive proof of life on other planets been found at last? Or is this just another over-hyped event like Geraldo's opening of Al Capone's vault? Will UNM be at the center of the most ground-breaking story of the millennium, or will UNM's integrity as a scientific research institution be co-opted by sleazy network executives out for a fast buck? Will there be a name change to the UNM College of Arts and Science Fictions? Maybe we'll find out November 22nd.
What does former colleague Kevin Randle think about Don Schmitt? It ain't pretty!
http://www.ufomind.com/area51/list/1997/nov/a04-003.shtml
CSFNM Blooper...
The Creation Science Fellowship of New Mexico (CSFNM, http://www.swcp.com/creation/ ) has many celebrated New Mexican creationists as members, including Russ Humphreys, internationally-known "creation physicist." Like NMSR, CSFNM has a monthly newsletter. Our two groups squared off for a newsletter/web debate a couple of years ago (http://www.nmsr.org/debate.htm).
Thus it was with interest I read a letter from a correspondent in Lousiana, who stumbled onto a CSFNM Blooper while he was surfing the web. It seems the January 2002 CSFNM newsletter (Volume 13, Number 1), at:
http://www.swcp.com/creation/news/0201.htm
had this item:
"A Problem With Long Ages.
An example of polystrate trees is found in the Tennessee coal beds. One of the coal beds is 1,000 feet thick and supposedly took 100 million years, from the Ordovician to the Pennsylvanian periods, to form. Pennsylvanian Coal Bed 1,000 feet thick Ordivician Ordivician [sic] This coal bed contains many polystrate fossil trees positioned at many different levels in the coal bed. Era Period - for reference, not for real Cenozoic Quaternary Tertiary Mesozoic Cretaceous Jurassic Triassic Paleozoic Permian Pennsylvanian Mississipian Devonian Silurian Ordovician Cambrian."
My Louisiana correspondent, Paul, said "The original source of this very imaginative statement was a homeschool course subtitled "Fossil Trees in Coal Beds":
http://www.creationonline.org/intro/10/10320.htm.
This site, under the banner of the venerable Institute for Creation Research (ICR), is no longer accessible, but here are some of the things once displayed there.
Why is this a blooper, you might ask? Sure, there are coal beds in Tennessee, and coal beds run for hundreds of miles in Appalachian regions. But even the best beds are (at most!) only 13 to 15 feet thick, and often much thinner. And they certainly aren't considered to have taken a hundred million years to form! It's more like a few thousand years.
Check it out for yourself! The variation in thickness of a typical Tennessee coal bed can be found at:
http://pubs.usgs.gov/fs/fs115-99/fs115-99.html and
http://pubs.usgs.gov/fs/fs115-99/fig5.jpg.
And thus the blooper traveled, from the ICR, down to CSFNM. I guess it's Trickle-Down Pseudoscience.
It's Official...Dec. 28th "Free Electricity" Demo is CANCELLED...
Dennis Lee, promotor of "Free Electricity," has pulled yet another vanishing act, pulling out of his pledge to demonstrate his "over-unity" power generators at 100 locations across America onDec. 28, 2002. This is right in line with NMSR's Bold Prediction: "There will be NO demonstration of Free Electricity on December 28th, 2002. There will NEVER be such a demonstration. EVER." Lee's latest estimate for the demo: March or July of 2003. As Bart would say, "Yeah. Right."
See: http://www.nmsr.org/denislee.htm
Creationist sues Los Alamos Nat'l Lab for Big Bang Censorship...
The Young Earth Creation Club has announced that "In September of 2002, Dr. Gentry filed a lawsuit against the National Science Foundation, Los Alamos National Laboratory, Cornell University and others because of alleged censorship of his ten scientific papers that he believes falsifies the Big Bang theory..."
Sources: http://www.creationists.org/Robert_Gentry.html and http://www.creationists.org/gentrypressrelease.html
Of interest is the fact that the most aggressive young-earth creationist organization, Answers in Genesis, has recently published an article critical of Gentry's theories on polonium radiohaloes, one of his premier arguments for a young Earth. Tas Walker of AiG writes "Polonium halos have been found abundantly in granites, and minerals from some 22 localities have so far been reported to contain polonium radiohalos. Because polonium isotopes have very short half-lives, it has been argued that ‘granites with Po halos, regardless of their "geological age" are primordial rocks’, created supernaturally and instantaneously during the Creation week. Indeed it has been contended that such granites cannot be duplicated by natural processes. This conclusion has been disputed because of the geological relationships of the rocks in which polonium halos have been found. For example, some samples containing radiohalos were from dikes cross-cutting host rocks which thus must be older. Rather than primordial, it has been suggested that the parent material of the radiohalo was part of a conventional uranium or thorium decay series segregated by some geological process...."
The Geoscience Research Institute, the research arm of the Seventh Day Adventists, has also published an article critical of fellow young-earth creationist Gentry. In a 1988 article, Brown et. al. write "[Gentry's book] Creation's Tiny Mystery represents an interesting approach at a synthesis of science and the Bible; however, the argumentation presented has some serious problems. These include: *The inconsistent use of radioactive disintegration rates; *The fact that polonium halos appear to be derived from uranium; *The evidence for the origin of polonium halos by aqueous transport; and *The fact that polonium halos are found in secondary rocks. Because of these and other problems, readers of Creation's Tiny Mystery should be cautious in accepting its argumentation and claims of evidence for ex nihilo creation. ..."
Source: http://www.grisda.org/origins/15032.htm
Speaking of AiG, their influence is growing...
The Kentucky Post had an article on Answers in Genesis on Oct. 26th, noting "Using the Internet, a daily radio broadcast, a newsletter and books, the Boone County-based group says it is sending the creationist message to more than a million people each day, and its popularity is growing. The number of listeners and newsletter subscribers has more than doubled since 1996, and a sequel to its popular "Refuting Evolution" book came out this week. ..."
Source: http://www.kypost.com/2002/10/26/genes102602.html
Time for Atheists to Show Some Pride, says the Infidel Guy ...
ABCNews.com reported on Halloween that "The Infidel Guy, whose real name is Reginald Finley, is one of a considerable number of nonbelievers who feel they are dismissed as an insignificant group on the fringes of society. 'I believed for a long time that atheists were evil people,' says Finley, who hosts a series of 'Infidel Guy' Internet radio shows about atheism. Spurred on in part by controversy over the Pledge of Allegiance, the religious tone of 9/11 remembrance services, some atheists appear ready to speak out. ..."
Source: http://abcnews.go.com/sections/us/DailyNews/atheists021031.html
See Also: http://www.infidelguy.com/
UFO Poll: 72% think Government Holding Out On Secrets...
Space.com reported on Oct. 25th that "...a new poll released this week says a majority of Americans think the truth about unidentified flying objects (UFOs) is out there, yet the government is concealing it from them. ... This week, calls for the U.S. government to be more forthcoming on what it knows about UFOs increased following the release of the poll results. That RoperASW study, sponsored by the SCI FI Channel, shows that 72% of Americans believe the government is not telling the public everything it knows about UFO activity..."
Source: http://space.com/news/ufo_poll_021025.html
Strange Attractors, Snipers, and Internet Attacks...
Michael Malone of ABCNews.com reported on Oct. 29th that "Every so often an unsual juxtaposition of events opens a brief window into the world we now live in — and the future we are about to encounter. Last week was, I think, one of those times. The two events were the capture, and disclosure of identity, of the Washington, D.C.-area sniper; and the attempted destruction, via hacking, of the Internet. Most of us were so busy following the first that we barely noticed the second. But we should pay very close attention, because the two are intimately connected, and their combined implications are terrifying. ... What we do know is that both crimes relied for their impact upon 'network effects.' That is, they were designed to be very precise in their targets in order to produce the maximum secondary results. ... One of the most compelling new scientific theories is that of chaos, the sudden and explosive appearance of large random effects emanating from apparent normalcy. At the heart of chaos theory is the notion of the 'strange attractor,' the evocative title for the notion of a single event that acts as the instigator of all the madness that follows. ..."
Source: http://abcnews.go.com/sections/business/SiliconInsider/SiliconInsider_021029.html
It's Halloween...was the Amityville Horror Really that Horrible?
ABCNews.com reported on Halloween that "[George] Lutz admits that some of the scenes in the book and the movie — such as the green slime — were an embellishment. But he insists the book and the movie are based on events that actually happened during the family's 28-day stay in the house....Joe Nickell, a professional skeptic who has made a career out of challenging claims of paranormal activity, believes there is no scientific basis for any of the claims, from Holzer, the Lutzes or anyone else: 'The bottom line is that ... it was a hoax, or is, simply, at best, a matter that's not proven. And that's not very good for America's most famous haunted house.'... "
Source: http://abcnews.go.com/sections/primetime/DailyNews/amityville_021031.html
Answers in Genesis Blasts Kent Hovind...
Talk about a "wedge" - the staunch young earth creationists of Answers in Genesis have leveled a salvo at fellow YEC Kent Hovind (see http://www.nmsr.org/hovind.htm for details on Kent H). Here's a snippet: "Maintaining Creationist Integrity: A response to Kent Hovind, by Carl Wieland, Ken Ham and Jonathan Sarfati, 11 October 2002. ...Unfortunately, Hovind’s document repeatedly misrepresents or misunderstands not only our article, but the issues themselves. Our article was not aimed at any individual, but we plead with all creationist ‘lone wolf’ popularizers to familiarize themselves with the immense amount of good science being done by qualified (though fallible) creationist researchers, most of them not even associated with our own ministry. These are people who have shown that they are willing to be corrected, and to interact with their critics formally in peer-reviewed fashion...."
Source: http://www.answersingenesis.org/docs2002/1011hovind.asp
Oldest Link to Jesus ?
The AP reported on Oct. 21st that "A burial box that was recently discovered in Israel and dates to the first century could be the oldest archaeological link to Jesus Christ, according to a French scholar whose findings were published Monday. An inscription in the Aramaic language – 'James, son of Joseph, brother of Jesus' – appears on an empty ossuary, a limestone burial box for bones. ... The Rev. Joseph Fitzmyer, a Bible professor at Catholic University who studied photos of the box, agrees with Lemaire that the writing style 'fits perfectly' with other first century examples. The joint appearance of these three famous names is 'striking,' he said. 'But the big problem is, you have to show me the Jesus in this text is Jesus of Nazareth, and nobody can show that,' Fitzmyer said. ..."
Source: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A60769-2002Oct21.html
Sandia hosts ASK, Adventures in Science & Knowledge website...
"Sandia National Laboratories and Lockheed Martin welcome you to the Adventures in Science & Knowledge website. This is the place for information about our exciting education outreach programs. We invite you to look around. Something is sure to catch you eye. A.S.K. is designed for students, teachers, volunteers, and anyone else excited about science. ..."
Some neat stuff there!
Source: http://www.sandia.gov/ciim/ASK/home.htm
Big Crunch...the End is Near (say, 15 Billion Years?)
The BBC reported on Oct. 22nd "Forget the idea that we live in a youthful universe. If two American professors are correct, the cosmos is middle-aged. And it has not got an old age to look forward to. Despite what recent observations suggest,Professor Andrei Linde from Stanford University and his wife Professor Renata Kallosh say the universe will stop expanding and collapse in the relatively near future. New insights into the mysterious "dark energy" that appears to be pushing the universe apart suggest it may eventually lose its power...."
Source: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/sci/tech/2346907.stm
The Internet was ZAPPED...
The Albuquerque Tribune and AP reported on Oct. 23rd that "Nine of the 13 computer servers that manage global Internet traffic were crippled by a powerful electronic attack this week, officials said. But most Internet users didn't notice, because the attack lasted only an hour. Its origin was not known, and the FBI and White House were investigating. ..."
Source: http://www.abqtrib.com/archives/news02/102302_news_servers.shtml
Art Bell Retires (again)...
Yahoo reported on Oct. 23rd that "Radio host Art Bell, famed for his lengthy discussions on creepy conspiracy theories, will announce his retirement on air in the wee hours of Thursday, his syndicator Premiere Radio Networks Inc. said on Wednesday. Plagued with ongoing back problems, Bell, 57, will name guest host George Noory, 52, as his successor during his overnight radio show, 'Coast to Coast AM.'..."
Gee, and here I thought that all that HGH (human growth hormone) Art pumps on his talk show was supposed to help him feel years younger!?!?
Source: http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/nm/20021024/people_nm/media_bell_dc_1
Cost of Deceptive Trade
Practice Settlement: $1.9 Million...
...The Look on Miss Cleo's Face: Priceless!
Yahoo reported on Oct. 23rd that "Two companies that hosted psychic hot line queen Miss Cleo's late night infomercials will pay $1.9 million to Connecticut residents under a settlement with the state over a deceptive trade practice claim...."
Source: http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20021023/ap_on_re_us/brf_miss_cleo_settlement_3
Humphreys responds to criticism of helium Closure Temperatures...
Russ Humphreys has responded to Internet discussions on his helium closure arguments. (See http://www.nmsr.org/humphrey.htm for the details.) Humphreys, addressing his response to geologist Joe Meert, claims:
"...You have made three profound errors, assuming:
1. That my “196ºC below zero” is a closure
temperature,
2. That closure temperatures are relevant to this situation, and
3. That creationist scientists who researched this subject for years
are blind enough to miss something you thought you could spot
immediately after reading a short layman’s summary of the
work...."
Source: http://www.icr.org/headlines/replytojoemeert.html
Joe Meert responds to Humphreys's critique
"...Having said that, I fully understand the concept of closure temperature in zircon and biotite as applied to radiogenic systems. However, despite Humpreys claims that these are problematic for an old earth and that 'some helium problem' exists, there is simply no empirical or experimental data to support his claim...."
http://www.gondwanaresearch.com/rate.htm
Clinton Staffer goes after Pentagon re UFO's...
CNN reported on Oct. 22nd that "...a former White House chief of staff and an international investigative journalist want to know what the Pentagon knows, calling on it to release classified files about that and other incidents involving unidentified flying objects, or UFOs. 'It is time for the government to declassify records that are more than 25 years old and to provide scientists with data that will assist in determining the real nature of this phenomenon,' ex-Clinton aide John Podesta said Tuesday. ..."
Source: http://www.cnn.com/2002/TECH/space/10/22/ufo.records/index.html
Cell Phone Cancer Scares...On Again, Off Again...
New Scientist reported on Oct. 24th that "The safety of cellphones has been brought into question once again by research that suggests radio waves from the devices could promote the growth of tumours. Paradoxically, the study suggests that the radiation makes tumours grow more aggressively by initially killing off cancer cells....."
Source: http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns99992959
Tired of NM Politics?... Be Glad you're not in Indiana!
Jack Reynolds is running as a Republican write-in candidate in the Indiana Congressional District 7 race. There's already a Republican who won the primary, but Jack is hoping to get votes from the "Evolution is a Big Lie" voters.
Source: http://www.reynoldsforcongress.net/evolution.htm
More Toumai Debates ...
National Geographic reported on Oct. 9th that "A six to seven million year old skull from northern Chad that shook the world when its discovery was announced this July may not be what its discoverers' believe it to be: the oldest known member of the human family. 'It is an ape and not a human ancestor,' said Milford Wolpoff, an anthropologist at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. But the lead scientist who discovered the skull, Michel Brunet of the University of Poitiers in France, stands by his theory that the fossil is a hominid. Both sides of the debate are published in the October 10 issue of the journal Nature. ..."
Source: http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2002/10/1009_021009_chadskull.html
More: http://abcnews.go.com/wire/US/reuters20021009_479.html
UFOlogical Maryland Congress Candidate Finally gets a Media Interview ... in Pravda!
Stephen Bassett's third-party campaign for the 8th Congressional District of Maryland is dubbed "Disclosure2003." He has dedicated his campaign to the memory of the late Congressman Steve Schiff of New Mexico. The Candidate's Keynote Statement begins with "For the past five decades the human race has been caught between two worlds, two paradigms. While millions of people worldwide have come to understand they are not alone in the universe, that an extraterrestrial presence has become manifest about the planet, the governments of the world, frozen in place by fear and indecision, have been unable to publicly engage this new reality. This cannot continue. It is time for the United States of America, a nation which views itself as a leader of nations, to formally acknowledge this extraterrestrial presence. ..."
Source: http://www.disclosure2003.net/index2.html
But Mr. Bassett is having trouble getting any attention for his race. For example, the Washington Times said on Oct. 3rd that "The poll, sponsored by the Baltimore Sun and the Gazette newspapers, showed Mr. Van Hollen [Democratic state Sen. Christopher Van Hollen] leading Mrs. Morella [Republican Rep. Constance A. Morella] 43 percent to 40 percent, with 17 percent undecided and a 3.5 point margin of error. It was based on 803 interviews conducted between Sept. 25 and 28...."
Source: http://www.washtimes.com/metro/20021003-53689850.htm
Bassett has also been stiffed by the Washington Post and the Bethesda Gazette, to name just a few.
Thus, he was probably quite tickled to get some international attention. Pravda interviewed him (again) on Sept. 25th. Here's a snippet:
PRAVDA: It seems that there is quite a bit of interest regarding UFOs throughout the world. For instance, many PRAVDA.Ru articles dealing covering UFOs and/or aliens are often very popular. Do you feel that interest in this subject is growing, or has it always been at such a high level?
BASSETT: Interest in UFO/ET phenomena and the “Politics of Disclosure” has never been higher. This is due to many factors. These include: * The airing and re-airing of an expanding library of documentaries at the Learning, History, Discovery, Fox and A&E cable channels. * The work of a growing cadre of excellent documentary producers and directors such as Tim Coleman, James Fox, Kevin Barry, William Gazecki, Christopher Toussaint and many others. * Important new books which are providing summary understanding of the key issues such as Missing Times by Terry Hansen, UFOs and the National Security State by Richard Dolan, and The UFO/FBI Connection by Dr. Bruce Maccabee. * The groundbreaking work of the Disclosure Project to present the testimony of dozens of government and agency employees collectively confirming an extraterrestrial presence. * The never ending output from Hollywood of relevant entertainment such as Contact, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, ET, 2001: Space Odyssey, 2010: The Year We Make Contact, Communion, and of particular note, Steven Spielberg’s upcoming, massive, 20-hour mini-series, Taken, which begins in December of this year. ...
PRAVDA: Is there anything else you would like to add?
BASSETT: Sure, how much disk space have you got? Just kidding. How about some info on upcoming speaking engagements your readers might like to attend? ...
Source: http://english.pravda.ru/main/2002/09/25/37217.html
Will Bassett get any media attention before the election? Will Dudley rescue Nell before the train arrives? Stay tuned!
Summary Judgement against Dennis Lee in Spokane, Washington...
Robert Park reports on the Oct. 4th, 2002 edition of the "What's New" page of the American Physical Society that "...Armed with an affidavit by a physicist familiar with Lee's free energy scams, the State sought a summary judgement. Lee made no attempt to counter the scientific arguments, objecting to the State's motion only on procedural grounds. Last Friday [September 27th, 2002], the judge granted the summary judgement against Lee, denying Lee a chance to bamboozle scientifically innocent jurors."
Source: http://www.aps.org/WN/WN02/wn100402.html
Darwin was Respected, but it took a Century for his Ideas to Triumph ...
In John Tooby's Oct. 6th New York Times review of CHARLES DARWIN, The Power of Place: Volume II of a Biography by Janet Browne, Tooby notes that "For many years before his death, he was seen as Britain's foremost scientist, and he became his era's premier example of the scientist as celebrity. When he died in 1882, he was buried in Westminster Abbey, close to Newton. He was viewed, The Pall Mall Gazette said, as the ''greatest Englishman since Newton,'' the Times adding that no one had ''wielded a power over men and their intelligences more complete.'' But while Darwin levitated, Darwinism fell into scientific disrepute, eclipsed, incredibly, by feeble rivals, from a resuscitated Lamarckianism to teleological doctrines of predetermined progress. ... Darwin succeeded in persuading only one of his close scientific allies, the botanist Joseph Hooker, that selection was the chief engine of evolution. ..."
Source: http://www.nytimes.com/2002/10/06/books/review/06TOOBYT.html
800-Mile-Wide "Object" Found in Solar System...
The National Geographic reported on Oct. 7th that "Astronomers announced today the discovery of the largest object in the solar system since Pluto was named the ninth planet in 1930. The object is half the size of Pluto, composed primarily of rock and ice, and circles the sun once every 288 years. Named Quaoar (pronounced KWAH-o-ar), the object resides in the Kuiper belt, a region of the sky beyond the orbit of Pluto and about 4 billion miles (6.5 billion kilometers) from Earth. The Kuiper belt is chock full of remnants from the planet-formation era of the solar system...."
Source: http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2002/10/1003_021007_quaoar.html
Miss Cleo Sentenced ... Who Knew?
The Miami Herald reported on Oct.3rd that "Two Florida cousins and their companies behind the hot lines for television psychic 'Miss Cleo' have been sentenced to probation and fines, resolving illegal-merchandising felonies in Missouri over the supposed clairvoyant...."
Source: http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/4204750.htm
NetBits...
You find the weirdest stuff surfing around the internet. Here's a site with a neat Courier-type image of Mahatma Ghandhi:
http://ompage.net/Text/mahatma.htm
(It does have Some Assembly Required. You'll need to Copy, Paste, change font to Courier, and SELECT.)
CERN - A Whole Lotta Anti-Matter Going On...
Nature reported on Oct. 4th that "Two groups of experimenters - ATHENA and ATRAP - have been competing for several years in a race to efficiently produce slow antihydrogen at CERN's antiproton facility, the Antiproton Decelerator. The ATHENA group now report that they have made at least 50,000 atoms of antihydrogen. This consequent availability of antihydrogen in larger quantities will open up new areas of research, and its behaviour in comparison to hydrogen itself will be a good test of the Standard Model of elementary particle physics...."
Source: http://www.nature.com/nlink/v419/n6906/full/419439a_fs.html (FREE online!)
Gene Transfer... from Bacteria to Beetle?
Nature reported on Sept. 27th that "Researchers think they have caught a set of bacterial genes that jumped ship and relocated to the genome of a Japanese beetle. They could be the first to witness natural horizontal gene transfer between a bacterium and an animal. Although many researchers suspect this sort of gene movement occurs, no one had stumbled across evidence as direct as this before...."
Source: http://www.nature.com/nsu/020923/020923-11.html
Prayers Fail, Girl Dies...
ABC News reported on Oct. 3rd that "When doctors told Jacqueline Crank to get her daughter to a hospital for the tumor that was growing on her shoulder, the Tennessee woman turned to God instead. Now the woman could face murder charges on top of the aggravated child abuse and neglect charges that she and the girl's "spiritual father," Ariel Ben Sherman, already face. The 15-year-old girl, Jessica Crank, died on Sept. 15 from a rare form of bone cancer. One last attempt at using faith to help the girl was attempted at her funeral on Sept. 18, when Sherman asked a group of members of his New Life Ministries to pray over the girl's open casket for her resurrection...."
Source: http://abcnews.go.com/sections/us/DailyNews/religious_defense021003.html
Scientists Discover World's Funniest Joke...
ABC News reported on Oct. 3rd that "After a year of painstaking scientific research, the world's funniest joke was revealed today.In a project described as the largest-ever scientific study into humor, the British Association for the Advancement of Science asked Internet users around the world to submit their favorite jokes and rate the funniness of other people's offerings. More than 40,000 jokes from 70 countries and 2 million critiques later, this is it: 'Two hunters are out in the woods when one of them collapses. He doesn't seem to be breathing and his eyes are glazed. The other man pulls out his phone and calls emergency services. He gasps to the operator: "My friend is dead! What can I do?" The operator in a calm, soothing voice replies: "Take it easy. I can help. First, let's make sure he's dead." There is a silence, then a shot is heard. Back on the phone, the hunter says,"OK, now what?" ..."
The article also lists regional favorites.
Source: http://abcnews.go.com/sections/scitech/DailyNews/joke021003.html
Ex-Astronaut Aldrin Not to Face Charges in Punching...
On Sep 21st, Reuters reported "Apollo 11 astronaut Edwin 'Buzz' Aldrin escaped criminal prosecution on Friday for punching a conspiracy theorist who wanted him to swear on a Bible that he really did walk on the moon in 1969. Los Angeles County prosecutors declined to file a misdemeanor battery charge against the 72-year-old ex-astronaut, who said he was defending himself and his stepdaughter when he clocked 37-year-old Bart Winfield Sibrel outside a Beverly Hills hotel on Sept. 9. ..."
Study: Humans, Chimps More Different...
The Associated Press reported on Sept. 23 "There are more differences between a chimpanzee and a human being than once believed, according to a new genetic study. Biologists have long held that the genes of chimps and humans are about 98.5 percent identical. But Roy Britten, a biologist at the California Institute of Technology, said in a study published this week that a new way of comparing the genes shows that the human and chimp genetic similarity is only about 95 percent. ..."
Source: http://abcnews.go.com/wire/SciTech/ap20020923_1679.html
Tough Earth bug may be from Mars...
The September 02 New Scientist Print Edition notes "A hardy microbe that can withstand huge doses of radiation could have evolved this ability on Mars. That is the conclusion of Russian scientists who say it would take far longer than life has existed here for the bug to evolve that ability in Earth's clement conditions. They suggest the harsher environment of Mars makes it a more likely birthplace. The hardy bugs could have travelled to Earth on pieces of rock that were blasted into space by an impacting asteroid and fell to Earth as meteorites. David Morrison of NASA's Astrobiology Institute is sceptical that einococcus came from Mars, pointing out that its genome looks similar to those of other Earthly bacteria. But he admits that there's still no obvious explanation for the bug's resistance to radiation. 'It is certainly a mystery how this trait has developed and why it persists,' he says...."
Source: http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns99992844
Acidic clouds of Venus could harbour life...
The 26 September 02 New Scientist Print Edition reports "The acidic clouds of Venus could in fact be hiding life. Unlikely as it sounds, the presence of microbes could neatly explain several mysterious observations of the planet's atmosphere. Venus is usually written off as a potential haven for life because of its hellishly hot and acidic surface. But conditions in the atmosphere at an altitude of around 50 kilometres are relatively hospitable: the temperature is about 70 ?C, with a pressure of about one atmosphere. To look for possible signs of life, Schulze-Makuch and his colleague Louis Irwin looked at existing data on Venus from the Russian Venera space missions and the US Pioneer Venus and Magellan probes. They noticed some peculiar things about the chemical composition of Venus's atmosphere. They also found hydrogen sulphide and sulphur dioxide. These twogases react with each other, and so are never normally found together unless something is producing them. Even more mysterious is the presence of carbonyl sulphide. This gas is so difficult to produce inorganically that it is sometimes considered an unambiguous indicator of biological activity...."
Source: http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns99992843
see also
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/2282168.stm
Site of the Week:..
http://www.physics.brocku.ca/etc/cargo_cult_science.html
Feynman on "Cargo Cult Science."
"... I think the educational and psychological studies I mentioned are examples of what I would like to call cargo cult science. In the South Seas there is a cargo cult of people. During the war they saw airplanes with lots of good materials, and they want the same thing to happen now. So they've arranged to make things like runways, to put fires along the sides of the runways, to make a wooden hut for a man to sit in, with two wooden pieces on his head to headphones and bars of bamboo sticking out like antennas--he's the controller--and they wait for the airplanes to land. They're doing everything right. The form is perfect. It looks exactly the way it looked before. But it doesn't work. No airplanes land. So I call these things cargo cult science, because they follow all the apparent precepts and forms of scientific investigation, but they're missing something essential, because the planes don't land. ..."
A classic!
Latest on Hovind Charges...
Here is the latest (Sept. 21st 2002) on the Felony Charges against well-known young-earth creationist Kent "Dr. Dino" Hovind. It's still not clear exactly what will happen, but it looks like arraignment will be Oct. 4th, and the trial on November 26th. Hovind will represent himself.
9/5/02 DEFT TO REPRESENT SELF
9/12/02 WAIVED ARRAIG. PLED NOT GUILTY SET FOR JURY TRIAL:12/9/2002, DD 11/26/2002-9:00
9/13/02 COURT EVENT SET Event: DOCKET DAY Date: 11/26/2002 Time: 9:00 am Judge: TERRELL, TERRY D Location: M.C. BLANCHARD JUDICIAL BUILDING
9/13/02 COURT EVENT SET Event: ARRAIGNMENTS Date: 10/04/2002 Time: 9:00 am Judge: TERRELL, TERRY D Location: M.C. BLANCHARD JUDICIAL BUILDING
Source: http://205.152.130.8/cv_web_1b.asp?ucase_id=12619523
Physics Scandal at Bell Labs...
Salon.com reported on Sept. 16th that "In February 2000, a promising young physicist named Jan Hendrik Schön published some startling experimental results. Schön and his partners had started with molecules that don't ordinarily conduct electricity, and claimed they had succeeded in making them behave like semiconductors, the circuits that make computers work. The researchers reported their findings in Science, one of the flagship scientific journals. ...Less than five years after finishing graduate school, Jan Hendrik Schön was in contention for the Nobel prize. Then the wunderkind fell to earth. In April, a small group of researchers at Bell Labs contacted Princeton physics professor Lydia Sohn and whispered that all was not right with Schön's data. Sohn recalls that she and Cornell University's Paul McEuen stayed up late one night and found some disturbing coincidences in Schön's results: The same graphs were being used to illustrate the outcomes of completely different experiments. 'You would expect differences,' she said, 'but the figures were identical. It was a smoking gun.'... The duplicated graphs are not the only smoking gun. There's also the serious problem that despite numerous attempts, no other physicist has repeated Schön's results. ..."
Source: http://www.salon.com/tech/feature/2002/09/16/physics/print.html
New weapon against soil contamination... Evolution!
The Albuquerque Tribune reported on Sept. 16th that "New Mexico Tech has found a weapon against gasoline-contaminated soil and water - evolution. It turns out rapidly evolving native bacteria in about 175 contaminated sites in New Mexico have genetically changed, on their own, to eat the contamination. And Tech is trying to find out exactly how they did it. 'The organisms have adapted to the pollution,' said Rebecca Reiss, a biology professor at Tech. 'This is kind of the flip side to problems we're seeing with antibiotic-resistant bacteria. In this case, rapid evolution has adapted bacteria for a good purpose - environmental cleanup.' ..."
Source: http://www.abqtrib.com/shns/story.cfm?pk=BACTERIA-09-16-02&cat=AS
Did Earth once have Saturn-like Rings?
Space.com reported on Sept. 17th that "Earth may once have been surrounded by temporary rings of debris, much like Saturn, according to a new computer model that finds the rings might have cast parts of the planet into a twilight glow all day long. The idea is not new, but the fresh modeling adds weight to the plausibility of an asteroid impact kicking up a sea of orbiting debris, and it considers how the rings would have cooled Earth's climate. The new model, based on Saturn’s B-ring scaled down to Earth-size, was produced by Peter Fawcett of the University of New Mexico and Mark Boslough of the U.S. Department of Energy’s Sandia National Laboratories. It is based on climate models that had already been developed. The scientists said a ring might form with a glancing blow, in which a space rock and the debris it carves from the planet ricochet into the atmosphere...."
Source: http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/planetearth/earth_rings_020917.html
New Type of Black Hole?
The Washington Post reported on Sept. 17th that "Astronomers say they have found a new type of black hole and now believe those mysterious celestial objects exist in a variety of sizes, from small to supermassive. Two teams of astronomers, using the Hubble Space Telescope and other instruments, have found evidence for a type of medium-sized black hole, a class of the objects that has never before been seen...."
Source: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A30953-2002Sep17.html
Percival Lowell's "Venusian Spokes" Explained...as an Image of Lowell's Retina!
The New York Times reported on Sept. 10th that "another Lowell observation that has been even more controversial [than his reports of Martian "Canals"] — the wheel-like "spokes" radiating from a 'hub' on Venus — has finally been explained. ... Intrigued by the enigma of the spokes, whic
