This might be the start of a Monty Python sketch

They even titled the announcement “And now for something completely different…”. I’m going to be doing a new monthly science column for the Guardian, so once again, I have blithely stacked another deadline on top of the groaning pile already on my desk. This should be fun, though, and one must constantly be building beachheads on other continents if one hopes to take over the world. Besides, I’ve also been promoted to “leading American evolutionary biologist”, which will surprise leading American evolutionary biologist everywhere, but which will look wonderfully pretentious on my CV.

It’s also going to be a weekly column — we’ll be cycling a stable of science writers, including Simon Singh, Chris French, and Andy Miah, to keep up some regular science content on the Guardian, and you have to applaud the effort of the paper to do that, especially when science coverage seems to be weakening everywhere else.

I’m already whipping up a little something for my inaugural column. It’s got snails in it. I hope it’s not too continental for the British.

The greatest break-up story ever told

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Long timers here may recall that I mentioned this cool video by Nina Paley called Sita Sings the Blues several years ago. At that time, all that was available were some short but very pretty clips.

Good news! Sita Sings the Blues is done, and available on the web. It’s Saturday evening — go ahead, set aside an hour and a half to watch it. How often do you run across Hindu myths animated and set to the 1920’s jazz?

Speaking of Hindu myths, have you ever read any of their creation stories? Here’s one version:

Before time began there was no heaven, no earth and no space between. A vast dark ocean washed upon the shores of nothingness and licked the edges of night. A giant cobra floated on the waters. Asleep within its endless coils lay the Lord Vishnu. He was watched over by the mighty serpent. Everything was so peaceful and silent that Vishnu slept undisturbed by dreams or motion.
From the depths a humming sound began to tremble, Om. It grew and spread, filling the emptiness and throbbing with energy. The night had ended. Vishnu awoke. As the dawn began to break, from Vishnu’s navel grew a magnificent lotus flower. In the middle of the blossom sat Vishnu’s servant, Brahma. He awaited the Lord’s command.

Vishnu spoke to his servant: ‘It is time to begin.’ Brahma bowed. Vishnu commanded: ‘Create the world.’

It’s silly and magical, but it’s also beautiful. We hear that awful tinny poetry of Genesis so often that I think it’s worth looking around at other cultures just to see how petty and third-rate the Western bible is. Not that I want anyone believing in Vishnu and the lotus growing out of his navel, but at least it’s much more lovely and imaginative than the repetitive nonsense we’re used to.

Blood in the water

The blogs have talked about Bobby Jindal’s credentials as an exorcist for some time, and now, finally, after Jindal’s comical performance on national TV the other night, the mainstream media is taking notice. His dalliance with exorcism gets a write-up in the NY Times, where one of the more depressing questions I’ve run across is asked.

“That’s incredible. But is it politically problematic?”

It’s discouraging that we even need to ask this. A potential presidential candidate believes that a woman grappling with cancer and depression might have been literally possessed by a demon, and that chanting magical incantations cast the demon out. This is absolutely insane stuff. But of course, in this country it’s the people who question such ludicrous claims who are regarded as ‘close-minded’ and ‘weird’.

Discouraging as the fact that that question can even be asked might be, even worse is the answer. “Probably not”.

Check the poll results at that link. 40% of Americans in the 21st century believe that the devil sometimes possesses people. We hoped for flying cars, and all we got was voodoo and speaking in tongues. I feel a little bit cheated.

At least we can hope that maybe newspapers and television will begin to eye these claims a bit more skeptically. But don’t count on it.

Chris Mooney says something sensible

I know! It’s shocking! But then I knew all along that he was smarter than his flirtation with the abhorrent insanity of Nisbetian framing would suggest. He has an article summarizing the George Will nonsense — where Will promoted outright falsehoods in support of his global warming denialism — and Mooney states something in his summary that I agree with entirely. Well, almost entirely.

In this sense, I view the George Will affair with sadness. Sure, I share in the temporary glee of the bloggers. But at the same time, I know there are many kinds of journalism, particularly about science, that bloggers will never replace. They’re extremely well-equipped to pounce and skewer a George Will column, but hardly well equipped to deliver an investigative or narrative feature story. We’re watching the media change before our eyes, the science media in particular–and no one can say, in light of episodes like the latest one involving George Will, that much of old media doesn’t in some sense “deserve” what’s happening to it now. Yet if our only sentiment is joy over the bloggers’ latest trophy, or outrage at the Post, we’re missing something deep indeed.

While I do think that there are many bloggers who can and do deliver good narratives, I think it is fair to say that his larger point is correct: there is an ecosystem of the media, and we each have our niches; blogging is not and should not be the sine qua non of information delivery, and newspapers (and TV and radio and podcasts and magazines and …) have their role to play. The lesson of the George Will episode — and of the last dozen years of politics — is that the news has failed because it hasn’t fulfilled that role. Newspapers are supposed to have more rigor and stricter fact-checking than blogs; they are supposed to bravely dig deeper than the average citizen into the major issues of the day. They don’t. There certainly is no glee in that sad fact, but I think some joy is deserved that somehow and somewhere the failure of the news media is finally getting some exposure.

Let’s hope that someday that means clowns like George Will can get fired for incompetence, and that newspapers like the Washington Post will make changes to enforce accountability. It doesn’t now, of course, which is another reason to temper our happiness.

Desperate space filler, Oscars edition

No, my work is not yet done, and my deadlines haven’t yet been met, but I’m confident that I’ll reach my goals by this afternoon. Bear with me with patience, please. Until this afternoon, when I slap these puppies and ship them off to their destinations, I’ll leave you with something to discuss among yourselves: the movies!

Last night was Oscar night, and I had the awards yammering in the background while I was pounding the keys. I have to get out more; I’ve seen virtually none of the nominated movies this year. There’s something called “Slumdog Millionaire” that’s getting a lot of buzz? Shows what I know. I hadn’t even heard of it until last night. My pop culture cred just took a nosedive.

As for the awards show, Hugh Jackman was pretty and congenial, which I guess is the role of the emcee. The format was grating: at each award, they’d have five past winners come out on the stage and slather flattery on each nominee, while the camera locked onto each one, simpering and squirming under the barrage of praise. This was not good; Hollywood already has a reputation of being the domain of the vain, and amplifying the effect with a prolonged demonstration of how happy these people are to be fawningly serviced in public had me cringing.

The high point, I thought, was Sean Penn’s acceptance speech for best actor in which he shamed the people who don’t want to see equal rights for everyone, gay or straight.

On a related note, Bill Maher was one of the presenters for best documentary, and what did he do? Plugged his movie, Religulous, while moaning over the fact that it was not nominated. Bad form, Bill, very bad form. Maybe it just wasn’t good enough.

I did finally see Religulous a few days ago, and I confess to being a bit disappointed. It consisted of a series of short interviews with, for instance, truckers at a truck stop chapel, Catholic priests, an “ex-gay” minister, a Muslim rapper, etc., and it was all capped with excellent and scathing monologue that strongly criticized religion. Don’t get me wrong, it was good, and there were some funny bits, but something nagged at me throughout, and only when I saw the conclusion did I realize what it was.

Maher cheated. He had a clear idea of what his opinion was, but he wasn’t sharing it with the people he was interviewing. They were left to flounder and make poor arguments in part because there are no good arguments for religion, but also because they were left in the dark about what they were arguing against. It may be funny, but it’s no fair; contrast that with the Dawkins’ documentaries on religion, which are less funny, but more honest, because the people on camera know (or should know) exactly what they are wrestling with.

A better Religulous would have recorded the closing monolog first, and sent that to each of the potential interviewees with a note saying, “Here’s my position. Are you willing to argue against it on camera?” That would have made for a much more interesting movie, and Maher would have had to break a sweat to address criticisms…and it would probably be less funny. There’s a reason Maher wasn’t nominated for an Oscar, and I think it’s because his documentary took no risks, and didn’t probe very deeply.

Don’t vote on this poll

Just go and gape in awe at the obliviousness of our national media. This is a poll on US News & World Report, and it asks, “If you had a choice of four daycare centers run separately by Michelle Obama, Sarah Palin, Hillary Clinton, and Nancy Pelosi, which would you choose for your kids?” Incredible.

I believe that next week they’ll have a question about Barack Obama’s, Colin Powell’s, Al Sharpton’s, and Jesse Jackson’s hypothetical fried chicken stands.

Spanking New Scientist

If you open your latest issue of New Scientist (unless, of course, you threw away your subscription), you’ll find a nice little letter from three luminaries — Dennett, Coyne, and Dawkins — and one other guy explaining that Darwin was actually mostly right, contrary to a certain recent cover. Here’s a taste:

What on earth were you thinking when you produced a garish cover proclaiming that “Darwin was wrong” (24 January)?

First, it’s false, and second, it’s inflammatory. And, as you surely know, many readers will interpret the cover not as being about Darwin, the historical figure, but about evolution.

Nothing in the article showed that the concept of the tree of life is unsound; only that it is more complicated than was realised before the advent of molecular genetics. It is still true that all of life arose from “a few forms or… one”, as Darwin concluded in The Origin of Species. It is still true that it diversified by descent with modification via natural selection and other factors.

The flagellation continues.

I wish I were a Republican, so I could just make stuff up

Carl Zimmer is a little bit peeved at the ever flexible standards of the media. If you’re a science writer like he is, your articles get fact-checked until they bleed. If you’re George Will, conservative pedant and pundit, not so much. The Washington Post seems to basically accept whatever he says as gospel truth, even when he gets the scientific facts completely wrong.

Oh, for the day when our media wake up to the fact that they are supposed to be reality-based, not faith-based.

Oh, crap.

You may have heard that there is a new movie about Darwin in the works, Creation, starring Paul Bettany and Jennifer Connelly. We have a synopsis now, and it isn’t good news.

The Darwin we meet in CREATION is a young, vibrant father, husband and friend whose mental and physical health gradually buckles under the weight of guilt and grief for a lost child. Ultimately it is the ghost of Annie, his adored 10 year-old daughter who leads him out of darkness and helps him reconnect with his wife and family. Only then is he able to create the book that changed the world.

They’ve got to be kidding. I’m assuming it is only a metaphorical ghost, not a real one, but given the dreadful melodramatic botch of a story there, I can’t even be sure of that.