Read a little. Learn a lot. • Tightly-written news, views and stuff • Follow us on TwitterBe a Facebook FanTumble us!

07 Jan 2010 10:16

tags

Tech: Heavy cell phone use kills Alzheimer’s … in mice. Uh, OK.

  • We wonder what the mice talked about on their miniature cell phones. In one of the odder scientific studies to come out of the woodwork of late, scientists say that they found that exposing mice to electromagnetic radiation similar to cell phones reversed the effects of an animal version of Alzheimer’s disease. Did we accidentally solve the Alzheimer’s disease puzzle by talking on our iPhones? Whoa. That’s weird. source

25 Nov 2009 22:21

tags

Politics: Sean Hannity’s cold on how hot our planet is this year

  • You can also look it up, this is one of the coldest years in history, this past year.
  • Sean Hannity • Completely getting his facts wrong on how warm it is this year. Media Matters (which is admittedly a liberal site, BTW) points out that Hannity has repeatedly said that this is one of the coldest years on record – facts not backed up at all by the NOAA, NASA and Britain’s Met Office. Data from all three says that it’s one of the warmest years on record. We wonder what crow tastes like. source

13 Nov 2009 16:38

tags

Tech: A drop in the bucket? NASA finds tons of water on the moon

  • I’m here today to tell you that indeed, yes, we found water. And we didn’t find just a little bit; we found a significant amount.
  • NASA scientist Anthony Colaprete • Describing the excitement caused by the Lunar Crater Observation and Sensing Satellite, which crashed into the moon last month with the specific purpose of finding water. And oh boy, it found a lot of it: A dozen two-gallon buckets of water. This is promising for many reasons, including the fact that this makes a lunar space station seem possible. We just made a ton of nerds’ days with this news. • source

05 Nov 2009 09:06

tags

Music: Carl Sagan is so cool Jack White covers his hit records

  • Jack White is releasing a cover of “A Glorious Dawn,” a Carl Sagan-meets-autotune-meets-mashup ditty (featuring special guest Stephen Hawking), which is kind of like “Autotune the News” for famous scientists. What’s crazy is that it’s a full-featured pop song with multiple choruses. And now White’s covering it and releasing it as a 7″ vinyl record. Neat. (Note how we completely ignored the other news at the link. There’s a reason for that.)source

03 Nov 2009 09:34

tags

World: Scientists enthralled by giant 20-foot-wide crack in Ethiopia

  • 35 miles – the length of what could be a new ocean someday source

03 Nov 2009 09:17

tags

Politics: The Daily Mail writes a column calling scientists arrogant jerks

  • Yes, scientists do much good. But a country run by these arrogant gods of certainty would truly be hell on earth.
  • The headline to a Daily Mail column by A.N. Wilson • Where he criticizes government-fired Professor David Nutt, and the scientific community at large, for making arguments that are technically accurate. Cannabis is safer than alcohol and tobacco, and using ecstasy is technically safer than riding a horse. OK, the horse argument’s a bit misguided. But the unnecessary and misguided dressing down of the scientific community Wilson makes is far more appalling. Plus, he compares them to Nazis at some point, which means we can totally discount his argument. Idiot. • source

21 Oct 2009 10:16

tags

Tech: Scientists given money to create a Facebook for nerds

  • $12.2 million, and it won’t even allow you to stalk chicks! source
 

19 Oct 2009 20:08

tags

U.S., World: Spies! Israel! Scientists! Moon water! Stings! Arrests! Secrets!

  • We needed a feel-good story to make us forget about Balloon Boy. Thanks to 52-year-old Stewart Nozette, we have it. Nozette, a top U.S. scientist who found that there was a polar icecap on the moon, was arrested today for attempting to sell state secrets to who he thought was the Israelis, but was really the FBI. We hope he got what he wanted out of this – he faces a maximum sentence of life in prison if convicted. source

07 Oct 2009 09:42

tags

Tech: Thought Saturn’s other rings were cool? Check out this one.

Giant infrared ring around saturn
  • This ring is giant, way bigger than all the other ones, but we haven’t been able to see it until now. That’s because NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope works sort of like the signal that makes your remote control work. It uses infrared signals to pick up light which isn’t otherwise obviously visible.source

01 Oct 2009 22:18

tags

Tech: Meet Ardi, the superhyped, really old human-type thingy

Ardi
Hey bros, I'm Ardi. I live in a cave or something. I'm really, really old. I'm like prehistoric. A bunch of scientists just found me and freaked the (#^(^! out. Here are a couple quick facts about me:
4.4 million my age, give or take a few years; I'm holding the exact date close to my chest
Vampire Weekend my favorite band; I want to go see them live after they reincarnate me. That's why they decided to reveal me to the press, right? Right? SOURCE