Imagine that. The Republicans fighting against science, again. Clearly those whinging whales need to toughen up and learn how to survive in today's world. The world isn't going to stop just because the whales can't move aside from the steam engine of progress. They probably all drive Cadillacs and receive welfare too. Why can't they be like business and survive on their own with the help of thousands of laws giving them special privileges as well as billions in corporate welfare and tax code assistance? Those whales are such freeloading bastards.
Every year around three right whales are either injured or killed in collisions with ocean-going vessels like containerized cargo ships even though they are protected under the Endangered Species Act. Right whales frequently wash up on shore bearing deep scars from being struck by ships propellers.
To reduce ship strikes the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) decided that ships should restrict their speed to 10 knots or less near whale feeding and calving grounds during parts of the year.
But Mr Cheney's office, which tends to operate in secrecy, sent letters repeatedly questioning whether the rule was needed according to leaked documents. Flatly contradicting the scientific research Mr Cheney's staff argued, "that we have no evidence that lowering the speeds of 'large ships' will actually make a difference."
Who needs science when you can have a political hack instead? Everything about this administration is politics over competence time after time which is probably why Bush has such a low approval rating.
The head of the EPA's pesticide and toxic chemical office was to testify Tuesday before the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, along with an official of the Government Accounting Office that has just concluded an investigation of the EPA's chemical risk assessment program.
The GAO report, obtained by The Associated Press, said the EPA's ability to conduct timely, science-based risks assessments was being undermined by allowing greater involvement in the process by nonscientists, often in secret.
The administration's decision to give the Defense Department and other agencies an early role in the process adds to years of delay in acting on harmful chemicals and jeopardizes the program's credibility, the GAO concluded.
If you believe science, that is. The DNA study is discovering (or confirming) so many interesting pieces of information. To that end, Brazilian singer/songwriter Chico César and Mama Africa. One of my favorites.
Well, not just George Bush's marriage, but the marriage of every Republican who thinks we need to amend the Constitution to stop gays from marrying, lest all of America's marriages go kaput. Alan Colmes has more on his blog, it's truly frightening. Bwahahahaha.
Both teams refreshingly discussed science and investment in science. This is yet another reason why either candidate will be a welcome change from the extremist GOP crowd who deny science and learning whenever they can. The McCain and Huckabee teams had "scheduling conflicts." I'm guessing - and this is just a guess - they were wrapped up viewing important videos of Jesus riding in a saddle on the back of a dinosaur or some other "science" documentary rolled out by the religious right. Even just recognizing that dinosaurs existed is progress for them.
For years I've heard people talking about the parallel rise of weight gain and fake food such as sweeteners and other strange concoctions produced by the chemical industry. There has been little interest on the part of the current administration to study or report facts related to the impact of fake food but this Purdue study raises some interesting questions. Maybe when we have an administration that is curious about something(science, food, economy, foreign policy, pharma, anything) we might start to discover what is really going on with what we're putting in our bodies.
The report, published in Behavioral Neuroscience, presents some counterintuitive findings: Animals fed with artificially sweetened yogurt over a two-week period consumed more calories and gained more weight — mostly in the form of fat — than animals eating yogurt flavored with glucose, a natural, high-calorie sweetener. It's a continuation of work the Purdue group began in 2004, when they reported that animals consuming saccharin-sweetened liquids and snacks tended to eat more than animals fed high-calorie, sweetened foods. The new study, say the scientists, offers stronger evidence that how we eat may depend on automatic, conditioned responses to food that are beyond our control.
Funny, I always thought being a Republican was a lifestyle choice. Now I see that they're born that way. Still, with gene therapy, anything is possible.
From the LA Times:
In a simple experiment reported today in the journal Nature Neuroscience, scientists at New York University and UCLA show that political orientation is related to differences in how the brain processes information.
Previous psychological studies have found that conservatives tend to be more structured and persistent in their judgments whereas liberals are more open to new experiences. The latest study found those traits are not confined to political situations but also influence everyday decisions.
The results show "there are two cognitive styles -- a liberal style and a conservative style," said UCLA neurologist Dr. Marco Iacoboni, who was not connected to the latest research.
Participants were college students whose politics ranged from "very liberal" to "very conservative." They were instructed to tap a keyboard when an M appeared on a computer monitor and to refrain from tapping when they saw a W.
M appeared four times more frequently than W, conditioning participants to press a key in knee-jerk fashion whenever they saw a letter.
Each participant was wired to an electroencephalograph that recorded activity in the anterior cingulate cortex, the part of the brain that detects conflicts between a habitual tendency (pressing a key) and a more appropriate response (not pressing the key). Liberals had more brain activity and made fewer mistakes than conservatives when they saw a W, researchers said.
Human-animal hybrid embryos conceived in the laboratory - so-called “chimeras” - should be regarded as human and their mothers should be allowed to give birth to them, the Roman Catholic Church said yesterday.
Under draft Government legislation to be debated by Parliament later this year, scientists will be given permission for the first time to create such embryos for research as long as they destroy them within two weeks.
But the Catholic bishops of England and Wales, in a submission to the Parliamentary joint committee scrutinising the draft legislation, said that the genetic mothers of “chimeras” should be able to raise them as their own children if they wished.
The bishops said that they did not see why these “interspecies” embryos should be treated any differently than others.
