Perhaps this image will help fix the differences between the candidates in your minds.
Never get involved in a land war in Asia, never go against a Sicilian when death is on the line, and never try to compete with me in the crazy email category.
We have another debate coming up shortly, so here’s an open thread for you all to chatter on…if the software lets you.
There will be no drinking games allowed that encourage alcohol consumption every time POW is mentioned.
<sigh> If ever I hear the words “my friends” again, I shall gag.
Defining moment for me was when McCain insisted that Obama was dangerous because he would speak too loudly (while later castigating him for advocating diplomacy), and Obama came back to point out that McCain was the one singing “bomb bomb bomb, bomb Iran”. In other words, McCain was a desperate fraud while Obama was calm and well-spoken.
Although I also felt Obama was thin on specifics and rich in politician-speak. He didn’t thrill me, but he was solidly better than his opponent.
Oh, yeah…and when McCain called Obama “that one”. That was condescending and creepy.
Scienceblogs is experiencing some technical difficulties right now: the guts of the machine are being very recalcitrant and generating time-out errors all over the place. Please be patient and heed the message when making comments: getting an error when posting does not necessarily mean the comment did not get posted. Most often, it just means that the MovableType software has gotten very, very stupid.
And if you think you’re having problems with comments, you can’t imagine how bad it is for us trying to post articles. I just tried to create a new entry, and went off to a doctor’s appointment while waiting for the window to open.
I’ve read Steve Jones’ books and enjoyed them — so I’m really baffled by this bizarre report of a talk he gave. It’s either a massive example of misreporting, or Jones has a solid grip on everyone’s ankles and he’s straining to pull our legs right off.
He claims human evolution is over. The reason? Because not enough fathers over 35 are having children. That’s bad because mutations are the source of evolutionary novelty, and older fathers are more likely to have accumulated errors in the replication of sperm, and therefore pass on more mutations.
This is because cell divisions in males increase with age. “Every time there is a cell division, there is a chance of a mistake, a mutation, an error,” he said. “For a 29-year old father [the mean age of reproduction in the West] there are around 300 divisions between the sperm that made him and the one he passes on – each one with an opportunity to make mistakes.
“For a 50-year-old father, the figure is well over a thousand. A drop in the number of older fathers will thus have a major effect on the rate of mutation.”
This is true, but it makes no sense. It’s not as if younger fathers produce no mutations — they generate plenty. It’s a difference in degree, nothing more, so we still have plenty of new mutations percolating into the population. And of course, over most of human history parents have been relatively young, since you couldn’t count on living to the age of 35.
And then there’s this odd argument.
Another factor is the weakening of natural selection. “In ancient times half our children would have died by the age of 20. Now, in the Western world, 98 per cent of them are surviving to 21.”
That makes even less sense. Natural selection is going to eliminate variants; by reducing its effects, we permit more mutations to persist in the population. One moment he’s complaining that fewer mutations are being produced, the next he’s complaining that the mutants are thriving. Which is it?
I’m thinking Jones must be making some colossal joke here, or maybe he’s testing his audience to see how much illogic and absurdity they will accept. That’s the only way I can explain these strange claims.
I see that Larry Moran has just thrown up his hands in exasperation at all the errors.
My email was just beginning to calm down, and now Bill Donohue rants again. He names me and fsmdude, and since people can’t find a mailing address for a guy named “fsmdude”, all these cranky little old Catholic ladies are sending me their shrill denunciations of youtube videos, instead.
Oh, and Bully Billy has conveniently forgotten the history already: “It was a professor from the University of Minnesota, Morris campus, Paul Z. Myers, who started the war on the Eucharist this past summer by intentionally desecrating a consecrated Host.” I guess he never ever called for the expulsion and arrest of a student for violating a Catholic sacrament now.
Remember Rachel Bird and Gideon Codding, the spoiled, petulant little whiners who wanted their state issued marriage license to call them “bride and groom”? The ones who were being used as a wingnut cause celebre to argue that gender neutrality really does hurt heterosexual marriages?
Bad news. They won. California caved and changed the wording on the licenses.
Now gay couples getting married in California will have to get their revenge: they should cheerfully appropriate the terms bride and groom, too. Rachel Bird can call herself a bride (she could all along, of course), but so can the biggest, butchest, bristly-bearded gay leatherman with a biker mustache…and he should be able to get state recognition of his status as a bride.
It’s only fair, after all.
I may have to change my voting plans — a real wild card candidate has entered the race.
There is, of course, a poll.
These guys are going to have a lock on the cryptozoological/weird conspiracy/tinfoil hat constituency, and we all know that that is a huge fraction of the population in this country. Don’t count them out.
The University of Oklahoma joins the ranks of the many universities that are offering a year of Darwin celebrations. I hope the Oklahoma community takes advantage of the opportunity — the calendar has plenty of public lectures and tours and exhibits.
As long as we’re acknowledging crafty cleverness, you’ve got to admit that this is a nice twist on the “My Little Pony” theme. If I had a little girl anymore, I’d get her one.
Maybe for the grandkids, someday.
