Archive for the ‘Stupidity’ Category

Still need proof that The Star wouldn’t know decent journalism if confronted by it at an intervention? For an article about the vernal equinox, Star reporter Nick Aveling decided to ask to professionals to explain the vernal equinox. The problem? One of the two ‘professional opinions’ was that of Michael Barwick, an astrologer who is a member of such prestigious organizations as ‘Astrology Toronto’, the ‘Canadian Association for Astrological Educators’, and the ‘National Council for Geocosmic Research’. The idea that an astrologer could lend any type of useful professional opinion to a discussion of astronomy is laughable at best.

Whereas Astronomer Randy Attwood served the article well, answering the questions which the article set out to have answered, Mr. Barwick managed to make a surprisingly large ass out of himself for what is (all things considered) a relatively short interview. However, don’t take my word for it, look at the two answers to the relatively simple question: Does the fact that the equinox occurred at 7:44 a.m. have any significance?

Attwood: It’s the exact time when the sun is directly over the equator, but it’s not like you can go outside at that time and notice anything. It’s like one of those really useless sports statistics, like the number of goalies who have red hair.

A simple answer that directly answers the question in a way that even most of The Star’s readers would be able to understand.

Barwick: For sure. People could do an ingress chart, which is basically a horoscope set up for 0 degree Aries. From the basis of that, you can use it to make predictions on a variety of things including elections. But that’s not the kind of work I do.

Ignoring the fact that this answer seems to require in-depth knowledge of astrology to begin to understand (ingress charts? 0 degree Aries?), it also fails to provide anything that could even be accidentally misconstrued as an answer. As for predicting elections, we already have Halloween masks for that.

Just because the words Astronomy and Astrology are spelled similarly, it does not mean that the professions are equally valid.

As much as I respect the media’s distinction to reporting ‘both sides of a story’, reporters need to learn that the other side to science is not pseudo-science. There is plenty of controversy and debate within the scientific community to make going elsewhere for debate a non-issue. Even ignoring that, the different sides of a story are not always necessarily equally valid. Sacrificing accuracy and intellectual honesty for the perception of non-biased reporting isn’t a sacrifice that any self-respecting journalist should be willing to make.

You can read more about it on the Bad Astronomy Blog, here.

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• The vernal equinox: Science and mysticism

This article about an archaeological find that could support the existence of Jerusalem’s King David (whose existence had been disputed up until now, apparently) is for the most part a fairly interesting article about a fairly interesting discovery.

I say “for the most part”, because the article’s headline and the picture captions (undoubtedly not written by the author) trumpet this discovery as “‘Proof’ David slew Goliath”; the implication being that this discovery verifies the biblical tale of David and Goliath. Needless to say, even verified high resolution video footage of King David’s existence would not be enough evidence to validate his heroic biblical feats. Yet another example of a perfectly good article ruined by a sensationalist headline.

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• Dailymail.co.uk: ‘Proof’ David slew Goliath found as Israeli archaeologists unearth ‘oldest ever Hebrew text’

The Stop Sylvia Browne website has moved! If you haven’t already, you should go and check it out.

Link: http://stopsylvia.com

In this article, Hitchens talks about “the GOP ticket’s appalling contempt for knowledge and learning”. It saddens me that these things go largely unreported by the media, whereas past religious affiliations of Senator Obama can form a nation-wide scandal.

Found on this website, “Ten Questions to Ask Your Biology Teacher About Evolution” is meant to be a handy guide for students skeptical of evolution. According to this article at The New York Times, science teachers in the US are increasingly having to deal with similar anti-evolution ploys. Reading through the list gave me a few chuckles, so I thought — with only my knowledge from high school biology — I would go through the list and do my best to respond to the various challenges.

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1. ORIGIN OF LIFE. 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?

It appears to be a favorite tactic of anti-evolutionists to try to tie evolutionary biology with the question of the origins of life. The truth is, biological evolution, natural selection, and common ancestry don’t say anything about how life began. Life could have started any number of ways; evolution is merely the proposed mechanism to explain the diversity and robustness of modern life.

That being said, we aren’t completely in the dark as to how life on Earth began. Unfortunately, we may never be able to prove how life on Earth began, but rather only likely ways that it could have began. While there is some controversy as to whether the Miller-Urey experiment replicated the atmospheric conditions of early Earth¹, it did show us the possibility of creating the building blocks of organic life from non-living materials. In that respect, it is still an important experiment, with implications for our search for the origin of life.

Regardless, this is not a criticism of evolution — it’s a criticism of the Miller-Urey experiment.
Read the rest of this entry »

Shame on you, MSN!

*sigh*

Yesterday, to my stern disapproval, the normally science-friendly Discovery Channel hosted the documentary: Decoding the Past: Doomsday 2012 – The End of Days, a title which could have been a lot shorter, but I suppose they really needed to nail down that end-of-the-world feeling to it.  Anyway, while I typically love what’s aired on Discovery, The End of Days wasn’t as bad as I expected it to be; It was worse.

We haven’t yet really covered much on the 2012 nonsense, which I suppose we should sometime in the future (we do have more than four years to do so, after all!).

The gist of it, for those lucky enough to have not heard of the hysteria, is that the Ancient Mayans’ calendar ends in December of 2012, which has led many to speculate that the world must end by that date, and not that, you know, the Mayans didn’t want to waste their lives writing calendars for dates they probably wouldn’t still be around to experience.

In any case, the finite Mayan calendar is the core of the 2012 doomsday claims.  Once you sprinkle a few vaguely applicable lines from soothsayers of the past to support it, you’ve got an apocalypse-nowish theory compelling enough to get Hollywood’s attention. Read the rest of this entry »

The CBC posted this article on naturopathic “medicine” by “Doctor” Lorne Swetlikoff, N.D. (not M.D.).

The article is a load of crap (the claims can be easily dismissed as nonsense), but what do you expect from a “doctor” of naturopathy? What surprises and disgusts me is that the CBC, a supposedly reputable news source, thought it was a good idea to publish this story, and by doing so, endorse this type of “medical” advice.

I think I just used up my quota of scare quotes for the month. Damn.

However, there was one positive outcome to this article. The comments left by the readers seemed (for the most part) skeptical of the article’s claims. To me, this was a refreshing change of pace, and a nice reminder that there are other rational people out there.

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• CBC.ca: Water: Still your best health bet
• The Rogues Gallery: A Naturopath On Water

Without getting back in to the whole vegetarian debate, I just wanted to applaud PETA on reaching a brand new low in their advertising campaign.

Capitalizing on the recent Greyhound bus murder, they have released an advertisement comparing the bus murder to the killing and consumption of animals, which is reported by the CBC, as “…meant to make people understand how animals suffer when they are killed in slaughterhouses.”

It boggles my mind how even somebody who believes firmly in vegetarianism and animal rights could draw a moral comparison between the brutal murder of another human being, and the killing of an animal (no matter how cute or furry).

“We can’t do anything to bring Tim back or bring his family relief from their suffering. But all of us can ask what we personally can do to decrease our support for this sort of violence,” Freedrick said.

Translation: we’re a bunch of opportunistic assholes. Stealing animals and blowing up research labs is one thing, but PETA has achieved a brand new low by capitalizing on this event to try and make a point about vegetarianism. Regardless of your personal, philosophical, or religious views on the consumption of meat, I think we can all agree that this advertisement is in bad taste, and yet one more reason to say “FUCK YOU, PETA”.

Click here to view the advertisement.

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• CBC.ca: 40-year-old suspect held in gruesome Manitoba bus killing
• CBC.ca: PETA ad compares Greyhound bus attack to slaughtering animals

If you thought conspiracy theories couldn’t get any crazier, dumber, or both…

It could be real, it could be fake, but it’s nevertheless great stuff.