Monthly Archives: November 2014

Ferguson

Social Justice November 26, 2014 Leave a comment

As far as I can tell, the Grand Jury’s job is to determine whether a crime may have been committed.  An unarmed teenager shot dead in the street seems to be pretty clear evidence that a crime may have been committed.

It is not the Grand Jury’s job to decide definitively whether a crime was committed, and it is also not the Grand Jury’s job to decide guilt or innocence of those accused of a crime.

If the people of a community cannot even get a full trial when an unarmed member of said community is shot dead in the street, what alternative do they have?  If the system doesn’t give you justice, how can anyone suggest that working within the system is correct course of action?

One of the best things I have read during this whole mess is the suggestion about what MLK would say, and the answer that the non-violent protest loving MLK was shot dead by a white guy.

The Grand Jury decision was a travesty of justice.

Another Day, Another Science Discovery

Science November 20, 2014 Leave a comment

So, religion, any new discoveries about how the universe works since we last spoke?  No.  Too bad.

Because science has done it again.

Today the collaboration for the LHCb experiment at CERN’s Large Hadron Collider announced the discovery of two new particles in the baryon family. The particles, known as the Xi_b’– and Xi_b*–, were predicted to exist by the quark model but had never been seen before.

More confirmation of theories we already have about what subatomic particles existed and when.

Landing a Robot on a Comet

Science November 12, 2014 1 Comment

Today, the European Space Agency landed a probe on a comet that moves through our solar system.  Comet 67P/Churyumov – Gerasimenko now contains a hitchhiker.  These pictures show the approach.

As great as that achievement is in and of itself, there is something I find even more amazing.  From what I’ve found using Google, the comet is hurtling through space at just over 18 kilometers per second.  The Earth averages 30 km/s on its travel around the sun.  As a reminder, that is kilometers per second.  PER SECOND!

They fired the bullet of Rosetta from the Earth, moving 30 km/s, at a comet, moving 18 km/s, AND THEY FIRED THE SHOT 10 YEARS AGO!  And I recently saw that the plan for this experiment was thought up 21 years ago.

21 years ago, scientists knew that in 11 years, they would need to fire a bullet that would need to sail around the inner solar system for a few years, go into hibernation, come out of hibernation and hit a comet moving at 41,127 miles per hour TEN YEARS AFTER THEY LAUNCHED IT.

Your move, religion.

What Were They Thinking?

Politics November 6, 2014 Comments: 2

This is probably going to be part one of many, and this one will be rather short because it is just so totally incomprehensible to me.

A district in Colorado just elected a state representative who has diagnosed, at a distance, that some people have been possessed by demons.  A man who believes not only that demons exist but that they possess people and that you can tell those people are possessed from halfway across the country was elected to represent a section of people in the state of Colorado.  He is also a virulently anti-gay bigot.

Now, what in the world do they think this guy is going to do for them within their state?  Outlaw homosexuality?  Enact laws against demonic possession?

Seriously, what the fuck were these people thinking?