It only gets better from here, but I don't want to spam y'all...
11 December 2006
Scooped
Sometimes I am so glad I'm not in research anymore.
It only gets better from here, but I don't want to spam y'all...
It only gets better from here, but I don't want to spam y'all...
Aww.....
Foxtrot is cutting back to weekly. :( So sad, how'm I gonna get my dork on? The last daily will be Dec 30.
10 December 2006
The Life of a Scientist-Mother
This article is a small look at what mothers in academia, science, and/or research have to go through. Share it with friends and family, whether in science or academia, or with loved ones who are.
Princess Di's driver drunk
There is a reason I'm posting this story here, on Modern Science.
The wording in this article is very hazy. I read these three paragraphs as "DNA evidence proves the driver was drunk." In fact, this is explicitly what is stated in the first phrase! The problem though is that DNA can only ID people, it can't tell how much alcohol is in your blood stream. If they found out a way to get whether you were drunk from your DNA, that would be bigger news than Princess Di conspiracy theories.
The confusion lies in the wording, and is revealed with futher reading. What they meant was "DNA evidence proves the drunken blood belonged to the driver." This is a whole different story. Apparently the same sort of people who think the US couldn't figure out a moon landing but could figure out complex special effects not available until the 90's, thought that someone had swapped the blood of Di's driver with someone else's blood, and it was that someone else who was drunk. Oy.
Can you believe they had to do this DNA test just to appease conspiracy buffs? Ridonkulous. The DNA test said that the nucleated white blood cells in the drunk blood belonged to the person known to be driving Di's car. Next thing you know someone's going to claim that the white blood cells must've been swapped out from the blood. That's right, they're going to say someone centrifuged the driver's blood and the drunk's blood, drained out the nucleated cells from both and swapped them, and then put back the blood that has the driver's nucleated cells and the rest of the components from the drunk. Just watch.
New DNA evidence proves the driver of Princess Diana's car was drunk on the night of her fatal crash in a Paris underpass in 1997, the British Broadcasting Corp. reported Saturday.
The tests confirm that original post-mortem blood samples were from driver Henri Paul and that he had three times the French legal limit of alcohol in his blood, the BBC said, quoting from a documentary it will screen Sunday.
...
Conspiracy theorists have claimed that Paul's blood samples were swapped with blood from someone else -- who was drunk -- and contended that the driver had not been drinking on the night Diana died.
The wording in this article is very hazy. I read these three paragraphs as "DNA evidence proves the driver was drunk." In fact, this is explicitly what is stated in the first phrase! The problem though is that DNA can only ID people, it can't tell how much alcohol is in your blood stream. If they found out a way to get whether you were drunk from your DNA, that would be bigger news than Princess Di conspiracy theories.
The confusion lies in the wording, and is revealed with futher reading. What they meant was "DNA evidence proves the drunken blood belonged to the driver." This is a whole different story. Apparently the same sort of people who think the US couldn't figure out a moon landing but could figure out complex special effects not available until the 90's, thought that someone had swapped the blood of Di's driver with someone else's blood, and it was that someone else who was drunk. Oy.
Can you believe they had to do this DNA test just to appease conspiracy buffs? Ridonkulous. The DNA test said that the nucleated white blood cells in the drunk blood belonged to the person known to be driving Di's car. Next thing you know someone's going to claim that the white blood cells must've been swapped out from the blood. That's right, they're going to say someone centrifuged the driver's blood and the drunk's blood, drained out the nucleated cells from both and swapped them, and then put back the blood that has the driver's nucleated cells and the rest of the components from the drunk. Just watch.
09 December 2006
Hubble Deep Field video
Man, Jethereal finds me the bestest things. And this is one of them.
I wonder when my little group will be able to do that. :-P I'm still keeping my fingers crossed on the grant. We won't know until February, and I haven't had the time/energy to do any other applications. I figure if we don't get this one I'll spend all summer writing others!
I wonder when my little group will be able to do that. :-P I'm still keeping my fingers crossed on the grant. We won't know until February, and I haven't had the time/energy to do any other applications. I figure if we don't get this one I'll spend all summer writing others!
Because everyone needs a fscking bright laser
Do you need a laser that actually can be seen in air? You really need to be able to pop balloons and light matches at 46 feet. And of course we all know how badly you've wanted to tape a laser on the end of a glass fiber optic-type tube and have a light saber. Since all this is true, check out Wicked Lasers, especially their videos.
01 December 2006
Republicans want law to trump science
Lame duck Republicans want a law to define that a fetus can feel pain at 20 weeks. Scientists have accepted that a fetus can feel pain at 28 weeks (7 months), but have not come to a consensus about 20 weeks - the fetus does withdraw from stimuli, but it could be a reflex due to any stimuli, or a pain response, it's not clear.
Folks, passing a law doesn't make anything more true. You can't "legalize" that pain starts at 28 weeks if it turns out that it doesn't. You can't make the sky pink by passing a law. You can't make π equal to 3. It just doesn't work that way, these are fundamental properties of the universe, and the universe doesn't give a shit about the laws humans make up. Someone should send these idiots back to grammar school.
Folks, passing a law doesn't make anything more true. You can't "legalize" that pain starts at 28 weeks if it turns out that it doesn't. You can't make the sky pink by passing a law. You can't make π equal to 3. It just doesn't work that way, these are fundamental properties of the universe, and the universe doesn't give a shit about the laws humans make up. Someone should send these idiots back to grammar school.
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