Earth Science Week

This week is EARTH SCIENCE WEEK.

pass it on to your kids science teacher.

A World of Hulks

Imagine a world where everyone was like the Incredible Hulk. Crazy i know. Everyone running around saying shit like;

'don't make me angry, you wouldn't like me when i'm angry.'

This crazy idea popped into my head after reading a story over at the NewScientist web site about a gamma ray burst that is/was directed and coming towards Earth. Apparently on March 19 some astronomers using NASAs Swift x-ray telescope and the Optical Ultraviolet Telescope saw a record 4 bursts of gamma-rays.

'Gamma-rays bursts are thought to be caused when massive, spinning stars collapse to form black holes and spew out jets of gas at nearly the speed of light. These send gamma rays our way, along with visible light produced where the jet heats up surrounding gas.' -Rachel Courtland NS

The two NS stories are HERE and HERE. And if Marvel Comics has any this to do with it we may all be needing some purple pants and anger management classes.

Origin of the Hulk

Faith in Science

All through the night and this morning...and even now as I write it has been raining pretty hard. Flood warnings are in effect...my little rain swale and road side ditch are flowing like mad and at about 6:30 am water starting dripping though the celling near the wood stove pipe.

"Oh Fuck!" Were the only two words I got out before I leaped into action. Knocking over chairs to get to the stove, grab a bucket and get it catching I realized that I would be spending some QT this morning with my attic.

I pull the car out of the garage, get the ladder out of the shed and get my self into the attic space to check out the situation. Unexpectedly, the rain was not coming from the stove pipe hole. I traced the water over to a roof truss. It was seeping in, probably through a nail hole or crack in the asphalt shingles. After moving the insulation I could see it was running down the truss onto and across the sheet rock celling to the stove pipe.

How the fuck am I going to stop this? Its not like an actual hole that could be plugged. Then in a BRILLIANT flash of ingenuity some help from physics, hydrology and an old episode of Mr. Wizards World I did this:

<-------------------

Wet string is tied around the wood and runs down into a bucket. The surface water tension will now divert the water from the wood to the string and capture it in the bucket. I tied two for redundancy. I watched it for a little while and it seems to be working. It only needs to be temporary because the rain should be stopping later tonight. I can probably fix the shingles this weekend.

Faith in science comes in, in that I had to still get to work and leave the apparatus unattended. If the laws of physics don't change between now and 6pm I should be all set.

Isn't Science Great?

Creation Museum

Surfing around last night I came across the website for the Creation Museum. Then I found some pictures via Digg apparently taken of the displays. Going through and reading the summary panels of the displays I noticed a couple of things worth noting. I see the words 'probably' and 'legend' being used.

Well then if its a legend IT MUST BE TRUE. Who would make up such a thing?

*Can you hear me rolling my eyes?*

Moving on... take a look a the image below titled (I presume) "Life Recovers":

Anything about that strike you as odd? In the first frame it seems to me that "Organisms changing rapidly as the earth changes" is called EVOLUTION. They even made up a pictorgraph showing an evolutionary chain for the horse.
Then the second frame "Variety recovers rapidly after the flood". The frame is showing the evolutionary changes of the dog. WTF?

Why do the creationists refuse to accept evolution? The bible is a historical document. A very old one at that. Think of the bible as a very old version of the game 'telephone', to take it for its literal word is preposterous.

Believe in science. Believe in facts. Not Legends.

What are your comments?