Failure theater: Congressional Republicans, rather than agree with Trump’s proposal to eliminate dozens of government agencies, have instead upped their budgets.
And the elitists in Washington wonder why Trump won the election.
Peer-review science at its best! A fake science paper, loaded with quotes and references to the Star Wars movies, has been published or accepted for publication by four medical journals.
A neurology expert has revealed they were able to convince a trio of medical journals to publish their Star Wars-themed ‘fake’ manuscript, despite it being packed full of references to George Lucas’ iconic series. The author, who writes online under the name Neuroskeptic, said their paper titled ‘Mitochondria: Structure, Function and Clinical Relevance’ was poorly written and ‘an absurd mess of factual errors, plagiarism and movie quotes’.
‘I wanted to test whether ‘predatory’ journals would publish an obviously absurd paper,’ the hoax’s author wrote for Discover Magazine. ‘So I created a spoof manuscript about “midi-chlorians” – the fictional entities which live inside cells and give Jedi their powers in Star Wars. I filled it with other references to the galaxy far, far away, and submitted it to nine journals under the names of Dr Lucas McGeorge and Dr Annette Kin.’
The name of the authors given in the fake piece are thinly-veiled references to Lucas – Star Wars’ creator – and Anakin Skywalker. Neuroskeptic went on in their blog post to explain the paper was picked up by four different journals – the American Journal of Medical and Biological Research, the International Journal of Molecular Biology: Open Access, the Austin Journal of Pharmacology and Therapeutics, and American Research Journal of Biosciences. The AJMBR did not publish the paper but did request a $360 fee in order to do so.
That this keeps happening suggests that much of what is published in peer-review journals is equally bad, and should never see the light of day. The bad work gets published because the journals make their money by charging the scientists to publish things, and the scientists need to get in print to justify their cushy jobs in academia. Sadly, no one seems to care whether they can teach.
U.R. Rao, the man who led the design and construction of India’s first satellite in 1975, has passed away at 85.
After graduation from Madras University and post-graduation from Banaras Hindu University, Rao went to the US in the early 1960s to work in the faculty of MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) at Cambridge in Maryland and as an Assistant Professor at University of Texas in Dallas.
On returning to India in 1966, Rao joined PRL in Ahmedabad as professor under the guidance of Vikram Sarabhai, architect of the Indian space science, and shifted to Bengaluru to work as a space scientist at ISRO’s satellite centre in 1972. “Under Rao’s guidance, the first Indian satellite ‘Aryabhata’ was built in 1975 to use space technology for the country’s socio-economic development. On its success, about 20 satellites were developed and launched for various space applications spanning communications, remote sensing and weather under his supervision,” an official said.
He subsequently became head of ISRO from 1984 to 1994, when they developed their first rocket, the ASLV, which became today’s PSLV, as well as began their development of the GSLV.
Yawn. NASA and Lockheed Martin have partnered to re-purpose a leftover shuttle cargo module into a ground-based simulated interplanetary spaceship.
Lockheed Martin announced it will refurbish the Donatello multi-purpose logistics module (MLPM), transforming from it from its original, unrealized role as a supply conveyor for the International Space Station to a test and training model of a living area for astronauts working beyond Earth orbit. The work is being done under a public-private partnership between the aerospace corporation and NASA. “We are excited to work with NASA to repurpose a historic piece of flight hardware,” said Bill Pratt, Lockheed Martin’s program manager for the deep space habitat contract, in a statement.
…Over an 18-month period, Lockheed Martin will build upon its deep space habitat concept it developed during the first phase of NASA’s Next Space Technologies for Exploration Partnerships, or NextSTEP, program by using virtual and augmented reality prototyping in an effort to reduce costs and schedule, as well as identify and address issues while early in the design process. The results, to be shared with the space agency, will help to further understanding of the systems, standards and interfaces needed to make living in deep space possible.
This is nice, but it is essentially make-work for Lockheed Martin and a waste of money. At this stage of our engineering knowledge, we need to fly our interplanetary spaceship prototypes. Building them on the ground can only provide a limited amount of new knowledge, much of which has already been learned from numerous very similar past ground-based experiments.
For example, why isn’t NASA and Lockheed Martin also partnering with SpaceX, contracting to fly Donatello on the Falcon Heavy? That makes a lot more sense, and would not cost a lot of additional money. In fact, it might be quite cheap, since SpaceX needs customers willing to gamble on its new heavy-lift rocket.
Embedded below the fold. The first half was almost entirely devoted to SpaceX and the reasons for their apparent shift from Mars to the Moon.
» Read more
An evening pause: In honor of what happened today, 48 years ago.
Hat tip Insomnious.
Capitlism in space: It appears that the schedule for the first unmanned and manned test flights of the commercial capsules being built by SpaceX and Boeing is getting more certain.
The latest SpaceX schedule calls for an uncrewed test flight in February 2018, followed by a crewed test flight in June 2018. Boeing’s schedule anticipates an uncrewed test flight in June 2018 and a crewed test flight in August 2018.
While this sounds encouraging, the story contradicts a Boeing report last week that suggested their first manned flight would be delayed into the fourth quarter of 2018. Both stories however pin the first unmanned demo flight for June 2018, which now seems to be a firm date.
The coming dark age: Because algebra is hard for many minority students, the California community college system is considering eliminating their algebra requirement.
“The second thing I’d say is yes, this is a civil rights issue, but this is also something that plagues all Americans — particularly low-income Americans,” [said Eloy Ortiz Oakley, chancellor of the California community college system.] If you think about all the underemployed or unemployed Americans in this country who cannot connect to a job in this economy — which is unforgiving of those students who don’t have a credential — the biggest barrier for them is this algebra requirement. It’s what has kept them from achieving a credential.”
Hey, Chancellor Oakley, you know that you are implying that blacks and minorities are not capable of understanding algebra.
Meanwhile I, as a conservative, instead think that if we demand them to do better, they will do better.
So who’s the racist?
You get the government you deserve: The New York City health department has been fining pet sitters and trying to block online services that link pets to sitters because the city law bans pet sitting without a kennel license as well as bans issuing that license to private homes.
Health Department rules ban anyone from taking money to care for an animal outside a licensed kennel — and the department has warned a popular pet-sitting app that its users are breaking the law.
“The laws are antiquated,” said Chad Bacon, 29, a dog sitter in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, with the app Rover. “If you’re qualified and able to provide a service, I don’t think you should be penalized.”
I must admit that I have very little sympathy for these pet sitters. New Yorkers have been voting for a big intrusive city government for more than a century. This is what they wished for. This is what they get. Nonetheless, while it might make sense for the local government to place limits on the number of pets allowed in a private home in a crowded place like New York, for it to ban anyone from earning any money for taking care of someone else’s pets is a clear abuse of power.
This story compares a 1971 National Geographic map of the Arctic Ocean and its icecap with modern satellite data, and finds that the icecap is actually significantly larger now.
Take a look. Then come back to read my analysis.
Back? Okay. First, we are presently in the midst of summer in the Arctic, so the icecap shown on the modern map should shrink somewhat this year. Second, it is not clear what time of year the National Geographic map portrays. Is it maximum ice during the winter? Or they average for the year?
These questions however avoid the bigger point here, which is that there doesn’t really appear to be any significant change overall to the Arctic icecap in the past half century. The icecap had seen some major shrinkage during the first decade of the 21st century, but in recent years it has begun recovering. So much for the many past predictions by global warming activists that the Arctic will be ice free in summer because of global warming, by 2008, 2014, or 2018.
Fascist Berkeley: A lecture at a Berkeley church for a local leftwing radio station by atheist and scientist Richard Dawkins was canceled when the station learned he had posted some tweets criticizing Islam.
Essentially, the left can’t tolerate any dissent of any kind, and will destroy itself and everyone else if we continue to allow it to grow and gain power.
They are so inclusive! The organizers of Chicago’s upcoming “Slutwalk Chicago” demonstration (that’s their name for it, not mine) have decided to ban any “Zionist displays” at their event.
The ban was announced this week on social media by the organizers of SlutWalk Chicago — part of an international protest movement that “fights rape culture, victim blaming, and slut shaming.” The Chicago event is set to take place on August 12.
“We still stand behind Dyke March Chicago’s decision to remove the Zionist contingent from their event, & we won’t allow Zionist displays at ours,” the organizers tweeted last Sunday — beginning several days of exchanges with other users over the policy. These were distinguished by the organizers’ continued insistence that anti-Zionism is a legitimate progressive belief, and that any linkage with antisemitism should be dismissed as a discrediting tactic.
In one exchange defending the Dyke March decision to exclude the Jewish women, the SlutWalk organizers aggressively justified the action, declaring: “They were kicked out after a discussion where they made their Zionist beliefs known and refused to back down.” The Star of David flag was banned, they continued, “because its connections to the oppression enacted by Israel is too strong for it to be neutral & IN CONTEXT it was used as a Zionist symbol.”
The references to Dyke March Chicago above refer to the decision by that earlier gay parade to ban a pro-gay banner that also supported Israel.
I am old enough to remember the to-do in New York City when a homosexual group wanted to march and display their pro-homosexual banners in the Catholic St. Patrick’s Day parade. The parade was ordered by the courts to include the homosexuals, even though such behavior is considered a sin in Christianity. Will the courts order the organizers to include a pro-gay/pro-Israel banner in this march? I doubt it.
I also wouldn’t want the court to do it. These demonstrators should have the right to associate with whom they want. Unfortunately, the Catholics in New York should have had that right as well, but the fascists forced homosexuality down their throat, against their will.
At the same time, we must all gaze with interest at the hate and intolerance being shown by these fascist gays. It is most illuminating.
