jakelafort

Reg,

Speaking of astronomical hoaxes, I noticed from archives from 1938 newspapers that apparently no one in my locality in NC reacted hysterically to Orson Welles notorious broadcast. For that matter, there was no advertisement for the broadcast as far as I could see.

We do have a station in my area WBT 1110 AM who famously advertised that…[Read more]

Thanks, Reg!

Have a great week everyone!

Reg,

World of Woo: On endangering public morals!

Great story from The American Council on Science and Health!

An added absurdity to the drug laws: If a drug is classified under Schedule 1 and thus has “no approved human use,” no one is allowed to do medical research on the drug to find ways to eliminate the harmful effects of the drug and thus…[Read more]

Reading the Friendly Atheist article steered me to a positive story:

The joy of seeing a NASA official swear her oath on Carl Sagan’s “Pale Blue Dot”

Yeah, I know, calling abusing priests “brothers” is both both bothersome and creepy, but speaking as someone who grew up “in the fold,” Christianity is all about forgiveness and redemption, which is both its saving grace and its fatal flaw.

Thanks, Reg!!

“What I have found in my 60 laps of the Sun is that those who are most concerned about ‘attacks’ on their faith are those who doubt the reality of their faith in the first place. They are not at peace but in turmoil that they might be wrong – and believe only by forcing others to believe as they do are they somehow justified by the sheer number of…[Read more]

At least one of our spacecraft, the Parker Solar Probe has attained a velocity of about .06% the speed of light. It’s not hard to imagine that we could, only with current technology, send a smaller probe out of the solar system (e.g. with multiple planet gravitational assists) at perhaps 1% the speed of light. A hundred years from now, maybe…[Read more]

Unseen wrote:

The Dunning-Kruger Effect is the biggest pile of horseshit since The Germ Theory of Disease.

Exactly, LOL. This is way too easy.

In the

Unseen wrote:

That there’s no life anywhere in the Cosmos is a thesis that borders on the silly.

That such life evolved into highly organized, technological life long enough ago for their signals to have reached us today is a lot less silly.

I phrased it poorly. Should say…

That there’s no life anywhere in the Cosmos is a thesis tha…[Read more]

Re: A Lack of Alien Signals Actually Tells Us a Lot

That there’s no life anywhere in the Cosmos is a thesis that borders on the silly. That such life evolved into highly organized, technological life long enough ago for their signals to have reached us today is a lot less silly.

The universe is vast and while it is still young (if one believes…[Read more]

Regarding the article on freedom of religion…

What IS freedom of religion, anyway?

Is it the right of a religion to exist and to be practiced unhindered, including in some cases regulating society, or is it the right of individuals to practice or not practice a religion as they see fit?

Imagine a religion that dictates its women must wear…[Read more]

Fellow Unbelievers,

Uh, wasn’t Serbia engaged in “ethnic cleansing” of Bosnians, Croatians, and Montenegrins just 30 years ago? Yeah, no, their leaders have nothing to tell anyone about violence or guns.

And although he should have avoided that teeth-gritting D-word and replaced it with “Individualism,” George Orwell got it right.

The…

[Read more]

The Dunning-Kruger Effect is the biggest pile of horseshit since The Germ Theory of Disease.

I think the authors of “Debunking the Dunning-Kruger Effect” overestimated their ability to debunk the Dunning-Kruger effect. And there is no way I am wrong.

“It’s the guns, stupid” is a common invocation after another senseless loss of life to a mass shooting in the US. And it’s a challenging one, too, especially as more queer, BIPOC, and unhoused people are articulating the greater safety they feel with firearms for self-defense, in a political climate where state officials are less likely to value…

[Read more]