The above comic is created and licensed by Cectic.com.

If people believe the bullshit works, sell it to them! Happy Friday!

Edge.org has a fascinating article by Michael Gazzaniga, Professor of Psychology and the Director for the SAGE Center for the Study of Mind at the University of California Santa Barbara. The first part of the article appears to be taking from his upcoming book, Human: The Science Behind What Makes Us Unique. It’s a grand celebration of humans and their capabilities. It’s an uplifting read for anyone who, like myself, loves our species.

If that weren’t enough, Gazzaniga goes on to make a case that brain size isn’t everything when it comes to intelligence. This belief is a recent phenomenon. Much of cognitive science is built on the the size-intelligence assumption. But more evidence indicates that structural differences in brains also play an important role in intelligence.

This fact should be somewhat obvious since some species of whales have much larger brains then humans, but don’t display as much intelligence. The reason this was overlooked is because the size assumption was modified to account for body size. This accounts for the relative difference between humans and whales (2% and 1% of body weight belonging to the brain, respectively), but not for the fact that mice brains account for five times the percent of body-weight compared to humans. It is clear that structure plays a role.

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Taking inspiration from this Onion story and this recent comment by Diacanu, I present to you A Letter from an IF Proponent:

We Need to Hear From Public School Science Teachers

My name is David Brainsfull and I’ve been a member of CUAI for over 20 years. Over the past few months I’ve been allied with The Florida Bad-Policy Council in trying to undermine the new Florida State Department of Education Science Standards. The Florida Family Bad-Policy Council (FFBPC) is a hate based anti-choice, anti-gay, anti-homosexual (can’t be overstated) uneducational advocacy group that is associated with Dr. James Dipson and Fucup the Family.

The Florida Department of Education has written new science standards that will require Florida science teachers to present gravity as a proven fact. There are no provisions included in the standards that will allow for the critical analysis of the theory of gravity. Thus many of us that object to the “science” used to present gravity as a fact have no recourse but to teach the lie of gravity as though it is a proven fact.

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Janet has a question posted for this weeks TITMT. Allow me to quote her:

“What are some of your favorite quotes, who said them and why do you like them so much? Feel free to go ahead and quote yourself, too if you so desire. Don’t try to trick me though. I’m thinking next week my question my include a few quotes and you have to figure out where they came from. If I play my cards right, this can be interactive and productive. Imagine that!”

I have a lot of favorite quotes. Unfortunately, I often disremember the exact wording and who said it. Some of my answers this week will take a bit of research. Here’s one that won’t:

“Be a philosopher, but amid all your philosophy be still a man.”

I remember this one because I see it almost every day. It is, of course, the quote I choose to use in the header of my blog. One reason for this is purely practical; it’s short enough to fit in the header. It was also chosen because of my affinity for philosophy and because as it serves as a reminder to not let one’s philosophy consume one’s life. I’ve known a few people whose fervent pursuit of knowledge prevented them from living and enjoying a normal life. Even good things must be taken in moderation.

The only unfortunate part about this quote is it’s mild sexism in the language. I understand that such language was common in Hume’s day, but still, I’d prefer if the last phrase read “be still a human” or “be still a person”. Which do you think would be better?

Here’s another that requires no research:

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On Sunday, I updated my blogging software. Unlike numerous past upgrades, this one proved to be problematic. A database error caused my blog to be completely unavailable for Sunday evening and Monday morning. Another issue involved the ‘Recent Comments’ widget in the right sidebar. For a while, the top of the widget contained visible code. Though I tried many edits, I was unable to fix this issue. Then, inexplicably, the problem just disappeared. All’s well for now.

The most noticeable difference for my registered readers is that the Dashboard that you see when you log in has been redesigned. Post authors will see a similarly redesigned post writing page. The visual post editor is supposedly improved. Since I never used the old visual editor, I have no idea if this is true. What I do know is that the button to switch to HTML editing doesn’t work; at least not with FireFox.

The most exciting new feature is a built-in gallery feature. I have yet to try it out, but if it works, I may be able to integrate my old picture pages with the blog. Keep an eye out for that feature.

You can read all the release notes for WordPress 2.5 here. Let me know if you notice any errors, have any problems, or have any questions.

Janet has brought us another though-provoking question. She was inspired by a post by another blogger named Lorna. This week’s TITMT is both a question and a new vocabulary word.

disremember

\dis-rih-MEM-ber\
verb
Meaning
: forget

Example Sentence
“‘It was the British who did it,’ I said quickly. ‘I disremember the place and time….’” (E.L. Doctorow, Loon Lake)

What are a list of things you wish you could disremember?

I can think of a few things I’d like to dismember

The first answer that springs to my mind is all the embarrassing experiences that I’ve had. As a kid, I had social graces that could charitably be described as ‘sub-par’. They really haven’t gotten much better since. Thus I have no shortage of such memories. But, in my ongoing effort to disremember those experiences, I’m not going to repeat them here. I’m sure my wife will be more than happy to relate some of those stories to anyone who asks, though.

Really, I have no trouble forgetting things. I could even be called a great disrememberer! Usually, the first thing I forget is when other people make mistakes. I usually forget well before I even have a chance to forgive. So much of the list of things I’d like to disremember are likely already forgotten.

There are a few songs I’d like to disremember. Thanks to Janet’s blog, top of that list is The Facts of Life mind worm theme song. Speaking of which, I’d like to disremember ever single damn sitcom I’ve ever had the misfortune of watching. I’d best stop here lest this post degenerates into a rant about bad music and bad TV.

Today, I found these two juxtapose articles in one of my news feeders. Basically, on the morning of April 1st, 4 of about 30 protesters chained themselves to the entrance to a Bank of America in Boston. They were protesting the bank’s funding of companies with large carbon footprints.

Their voices were heard! Later that same day, Ken Lewis, CEO of Bank of America announced that the company is signing onto the Carbon Principles. These principles add an additional risk to lines of credit for carbon emitters. In effect, this raises the cost of procuring funding for projects like building new, traditional-style coal power plants. This is in addition to the $20 billion already pledged by the bank to be invested in ‘green’ technologies.

Never, in the history of the environmental movement, has a single protest been so effective; causing same-day changes.

Or perhaps it was a coincidence, or an April Fools joke by Ken Lewis.