Mike Dunford
tqa
Posts by this author
July 18, 2007
I like Chuck Schumer. He's a good New Yorker, with a good New York wit, and that - coupled with the fact that he's often right - makes him one of my favorite politicians to watch. Usually, he manages to come up with a pretty good line, but every now and then he winds up way off. Today seems to be…
July 17, 2007
In a recent Panda's Thumb comment thread, Pam asked (among other things) about our human species genetic Adam and Eve:
I have been reading for the last few years now, that there is a consensus among the majority, that humans have been genetically traced to a two human ancestory: A genetic "Adam…
July 16, 2007
Back in the middle of last month, I had a few things to say about Casey Luskin (DI flak) and his understanding of so-called junk DNA. It's now the middle of the month again, and Casey is again talking a lot - and understanding very little - about "junk" DNA. Larry Moran has a post up where he…
July 14, 2007
...laugh. Or cry. Or both. Or something. I don't know.
Just when it seems like the White House has managed to exhaust the possibilities when it comes to showing their complete and utter lack of regard for American troops, they manage to scrape up something new. The latest entry comes from the…
July 5, 2007
(This is the second part of a continuing saga. Part one can be found here.)
As it turns out, I actually did get a call back from someone at Comcast today - a gentleman from the Houston office called, told me that the corporate offices had asked him to get in touch with me, and proceeded to do a…
July 5, 2007
Up to this morning, I really thought I'd be able to get some real work done on this blog over the next couple of weeks. We're moving out of the hotel and into the apartment tomorrow (finally), and I had planned to catch up on a lot of the housekeeping around here once I have regular access to…
July 3, 2007
In the comments section of another thread over at Pandas' Thumb, I asked leading ID proponent Paul Nelson to explain why he thinks the differences between humans and chimps represent macroevolution and not microevolution. Dr. Nelson responded to my question. The terms microevolution and…
July 3, 2007
I've got CNN on right now, and I'm watching Tony Snow trying to explain to the media exactly why the President's decision to commute the sentence of Scooter Libby wasn't a political decision. It's pretty damn funny, really. The transcript should be up on the White House website shortly. If you…
July 2, 2007
It's amazing what a difference a few short years can make. Once upon a time, many prominent Republicans believed that perjury was a crime so heinous as to warrant throwing the president out of office. Today, however, we find that many of these same characters believe that any sort of jail sentence…
July 2, 2007
When an anti-evolutionist attempts to publicly "explain" a scientific paper, it usually signals two things: you should read the paper for yourself, and you should not be surprised to find that the creationist "explanation" misrepresents what the paper really says. A new blog post by Paul Nelson is…
June 29, 2007
Once again, the unholy wars have broken out here at Scienceblogs. The latest skirmish got started when Matt Nisbet put up an article titled "ATHEISM IS NOT A CIVIL RIGHTS ISSUE." In this article, Nisbet claims that atheists don't face a civil rights struggle, but merely "a public image problem."…
June 28, 2007
Both of this blog's regular readers have probably noticed by now that the blog hasn't been written regularly for a few weeks now. There are quite a few reasons for this, mostly involving the pleasures of relocation. Back on June 11th, which feels like an eternity but was just slightly more than…
June 17, 2007
So-called "junk DNA" has been much the buzz lately. A recent (and outstandingly lousy) Wired magazine article on the topic uncritically printed assertions by the Discovery Institute's lead hack Stephen Meyer that the discovery that some regions of DNA once thought to be functionless do have…
June 13, 2007
Reed Cartwright just forwarded me (and a few others) an email that was just sent out to an evolutionary biology mailing list. I'm going to quote it in full below. Don't worry if you don't understand the technical terms in there - you don't need to know what Bayesian methods are, or how they're…
June 11, 2007
It's been a quiet week or two (or three) on this blog, mostly because it's been a busy week or three in the house. We've been finishing off our moving process over the last few days. Since Wednesday, we've mostly been getting ready to clear quarters. Most of you probably don't know what "clearing…
June 4, 2007
Today, a United States Marine Corps panel delivered a message to all recently discharged veterans: if you want to maintain all of your benefits, you better sit down and shut the ---- up. The Marines, apparently unfamiliar with the concept of the freedoms of speech and free assembly, decided to…
June 1, 2007
Tom DeLay is on a Mission from God. Apparently, God talked to Tom. Surprisingly, it wasn't about the massive misuses of his (former) power, the rampant corruption charges, the criminal indictment he's under, being a Mean Person, acting like evil personified, or selling his soul to the devil. No,…
May 31, 2007
Yesterday, Casey Luskin posted yet another article outlining still more of the Discovery Institute's complaints about the Iowa State decision to deny tenure to DI Fellow and ID proponent Guillermo Gonzalez. This one complains about the characterization of Gonzalez as "having slowed down…
May 31, 2007
...odds are good that someone's breaking curfew. In which case, the pistol - though tempting - should probably take a back seat to grounding.
(via Pharyngula)
May 31, 2007
Note: This is the second of a series of posts that I wrote while on the Big Island last weekend. Due to a lack of internet access, they were not posted at that time.
We arrived at Volcano House right after sunset tonight. The best word I can come up with to describe this place right now is "…
May 30, 2007
Tara and Revere have posts up today on the story of the anonymous jackass of Air France Flight 385 and Czech Air flight 104. His story has been all over the news lately - he's the idiot with extensively drug resistant tuberculosis (XDR-TB) who took two intercontinental flights after being…
May 29, 2007
Note: During my trip to the Big Island last weekend, I wrote several blog posts. I didn't have internet access, so I didn't post any of them at the time. I'm posting them now, as originally written.
The 50th State is a group of islands, and if you want to travel from one to another you're…
May 25, 2007
The Island of Hawaii, that is. I'm already in the state. The last time I went over there, it was to do research. This time, I'm bringing the family and we're going to have a nice little vacation. I don't know if I'll have the opportunity to blog in the evenings or not, but I will try to keep and…
May 24, 2007
I just checked the Junk folder for the comments, and found that there were quite a few legitimate comments that came in over the last few days that had been labeled as spam. The IP address blacklist that Movable Type blogs had been using to check for spam shut down recently, and apparently there…
May 22, 2007
. . . what the hell is it going to take before those flaming idiots running Congress figure out how the hell to do the right thing? Collectively, they've got the spine of a beached jellyfish, the tenacity of a chipmunk on speed, and the leadership qualities of a concussed pigeon. At this point,…
May 21, 2007
The Discovery Institute is (still, and predictably) in an uproar over Iowa's decision to reject Intelligent Design proponent Guillermo Gonzalez's tenure application. The DI is claiming that the decision could not possibly be anything other than an example of discrimination against a brave non-…
May 21, 2007
The Economist is normally my favorite weekly news magazine. It has a much broader focus than any of the major American publications, covers topics in more depth, and uses a vocabulary that goes beyond the 6th grade level. Every now and then, though, they come out with something that makes you…
May 8, 2007
I saw my first political TV ad of the 2008 season last night while watching Countdown. It was a Mitt Romney ad, and it really changed the way I see him. Before I saw it, my impression was that Mitt's a guy who is willing to jettison any belief, change any position in order to win the Presidency -…
May 8, 2007
I'm guessing (hoping) that some of you might have noticed my lack of recent blog activity. There are a few reasons for this, but the big one is that since very shortly after my my wife got home, we've been in a state of military life known as "PCS."
For most people, "PCS" is the acronym that…
May 1, 2007
Jon Stewart's right. The Bush Administration is really making him obsolete. There's no need to wait for him to spin something the President says to make him look stupid and give you a good laugh. All you need to do is read the raw material.
Today's comedy routine - which I'm going to bet will be…