] To see what might happen if buckyballs got into the
] environment, Eva Oberdörster, an aquatic scientist at
] Southern Methodist University, put some into a fish tank
] at a concentration of 0.5 parts per million, along with
] nine largemouth bass. The buckyball-breathing fish
] experienced significant brain damage after 48 hours.
] Brain-cell membranes were disrupted, an affliction that
] has been linked to illnesses such as Alzheimer's disease
] in humans.
]
] Oberdörster's unpublished study, which was released last
] week, is one of the few completed studies looking at the
] potential risks of nanomaterials. There is some cause for
] concern. Two recent studies documented lung damage in
] animals after they inhaled a type of buckyball called a
] carbon nanotube. Another showed that nanoparticles can
] get into the brain if inhaled.
]
] They're also small enough to cross cell walls and leak
] into the nucleus, the home of an organism's DNA. And, in
] the case of titanium dioxide nanoparticles, they can kill
] bacteria. That's good news in a hospital, but bad news in
] the environment, where bacteria are extremely important
] for maintaining soil fertility, among other things.

Wired News: Big Concern for Very Small Things

] City officials were so concerned about the potentially
] dangerous properties of dihydrogen monoxide that they
] considered banning foam cups after they learned the
] chemical was used in their production.
]
] Then they learned that dihydrogen monoxide - H2O for
] short - is the scientific term for water.

Nice....

sacbee.com -- AP State Wire News -- City falls victim to Internet hoax, considers banning items made with water

] Check this shit out (Fig. 1). That's bonafide, 100%-real
] data, my friends. I took it myself over the course of two
] weeks. And this was not a leisurely two weeks, either; I
] busted my ass day and night in order to provide you with
] nothing but the best data possible. Now, let's look a bit
] more closely at this data, remembering that it is
] absolutely first-rate. Do you see the exponential
] dependence? I sure don't. I see a bunch of crap.
]
] Christ, this was such a waste of my time.
]
] Banking on my hopes that whoever grades this will
] just look at the pictures, I drew an exponential through
] my noise. I believe the apparent legitimacy is enhanced
] by the fact that I used a complicated computer program to
] make the fit. I understand this is the same process by
] which the top quark was discovered.

Funniest. Lab Report. Ever.

Kovar/Hall

] Why should we want the universe to last forever, anyway?
] Look—either the universe has a purpose or it doesn't.
] If it doesn't, then it is absurd. If it does have a
] purpose, then there are two possibilities: Either this
] purpose is eventually achieved, or it is never achieved.
] If it is never achieved, then the universe is futile. But
] if it is eventually achieved, then any further existence
] of the universe is pointless. So, no matter how you slice
] it, an eternal universe is either a) absurd, b) futile,
] or c) eventually pointless.

A really interesting article on Slate of all places on the end of the Universe. A lot of bizarre theories out there....

How Will the Universe End? - A cosmic detective story about the demise of the world, in three parts. By Jim Holt

] 11:19 am
]
] soooo busy!
]
] Wow, NASA is sure keeping me busy these days. (OMG,
] "Fascination" as wake-up music? I wasn't even on the
] drawing board when that song was cool!) I didn't even
] have time to take a picture of the heat shield -- they
] just kept me going and going studying the walls and floor
] of that boring trench.
]
] But today I get to drive! Squee! And I get to go visit El
] Capitan and take lots of pictures. They said I might even
] get to collect some souvenirs later. Don't you think that
] El Capitan is a hot name? Hot...like Stardust ... *sigh*
] (Well, actually I guess he's kinda cold what with being
] in the vaccuum of space and all... but ... *sigh*)
]
] Gotta roll!

hahaha..... an anthropomorphic blog for the opportunity rover on mars. this person is really dedicated to the joke.

~*~opportunity~*~

] CONSERVATIVE LYSENKOISM, CONTINUED. Tapped alum Chris
] Mooney reports here on a startling development: 20 Nobel
] Laureates have signed a statement calling on the Bush
] administration restore scientific integrity to the
] policymaking process. It's quite unprecedented, and very
] interesting. I've been following this topic -- often
] through Chris's valuable blog -- for the last two years,
] and I think this is emerging as one of the key political
] issues for 2004. For more reading, I'd check out the
] following three articles. First, Chris's profile of White
] House science advisor John Marburger in the Prospect.
] Second, this article by Nick Thompson documenting the
] growing divide between the GOP and the scientific
] community on a variety of issues where conservative
] theology conflicts with available evidence or scientific
] consensus. Finally, this piece by Richard Florida in the
] Washington Monthly, which explains how the Bush
] administration's anti-scientism (among other things)
] threatens our economic health.

very interesting. goto http://www.ucsusa.org/global_environment/rsi/index.cfm to read about the scientist's movement to stop the distortion of science by the bush admin....

TAPPED: Conservative Lysenkoism, Continued.

] The patient's rare condition is called pica, a compulsion
] to eat things not normally consumed as food. Its name
] comes from the Latin word for magpie, a bird thought to
] eat just about anything.
]
] Pica can take the form of eating dirt, ashes, chalk,
] hair, soap, toothbrushes, burned matches and many other
] things. Francois once treated a patient who ate forks.
] Most such objects are small enough to pass on their own,
] but some must be removed by doctors.

how have human's survived the evolutionary ladder this long....

CNN.com - Hundreds of coins found in patient's belly - Feb. 18, 2004

] When scientists learned last month that the word
] "evolution" had been removed from Georgia's proposed
] science curriculum for middle and high schools, some
] wondered what else might have been deleted.
]
] Some feared that the big-bang theory — the dominant scientific ]theory about the origins of the universe — would be absent.
]
]Their fears were well founded.
]
]The big bang had been eliminated from the science curriculum, and ]lessons on plate tectonics had been scaled back.

I swear, I may need to leave this state sooner than I thought..... Yeah, because the Bible is totally an authoritative source on this stuff......

Big bang busted in science class for high schools

] News and notes about the ongoing work of the Center for
] Responsible Nanotechnology (CRN).

Had you seen this site before?

Responsible Nanotechnology

] A Danish biotech company has developed a genetically
] modified flower that could help detect land mines and it
] hopes to have a prototype ready for use within a few
] years.

Yahoo! News - Flower-Power Could Help Clear Land mines