Daily Archives: September 14, 2008

This isn't The Onion?

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Oh, wait. It’s just the time-honored (sorry, honoured) tradition of writing a headline that has the opposite implication than the actual story.

Call for creationism in science

Professor Michael Reiss says that if pupils have strongly-held beliefs about creationism these should be explored.

Rather than dismissing creationism as a “misconception”, he says it should be seen as a cultural “world view”.

Teachers should take the time to explain why creationism had no scientific basis, Prof Reiss said.
He stressed that the topic should not be taught as science.

Yeah, I can see how summing that up should be worded as a call for teaching creationism.

Obvious to the Most Casual Observer

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Spot the Logical Fallacy

While I was watching the political convention last week (and the week before as well, actually), it astounded me at how often the speakers would resort to obvious logical fallacies. I counted five false dichotomies and four straw men within the Sarah Palin speech alone. Now, just to not be political: I’m sure Joe Biden also committed a whole bunch of logical fallacies, I just didn’t think about it until I heard Sarah Palin ‘poison the well‘ against Barack Obama.

Just discovering this, are we? That’s one reason that I dislike politics, and I was under the general assumption that others capable of spotting such arguments (e.g. scientists) felt the same way.

Hi-Tech Food

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Laser pizza cutter

I’ll bet the slices are all the same size, but it’s disappointing that the pieces still stick to each other.

Print me some toast. The scan-toaster.

The toaster utilizes a network of toasting “modules” — hot wires that rotate within a 30 degree radius — that burn the image or text you have selected onto the delicious slice of your choice.

Not commercially available, though.