The thought crime of global warming

"Florida Minitrue is taking doubleplusuncold for crimethinking words "climate change,” "global warming”, "sea-level rise" or "sutainability." The Governor, Rick Scott, says he "was not a scientist" which is plustrue. Is a doubleplusgood example of Doublethink, described in 1984 by Winston Smith." Who can argue with that?  How else should policy be constructed? How else do you decide on appropriate action? The GOP strategy for dealing with climate change is to define it out of existence. Goodbye Florida, glug, glug.

Wildlife on display at Wakulla Springs

The weather down there in Florida was as good as it gets in January, sunny with highs in the 60s. What a nice respite from our usual January weather in Lincolnland. Well, you can't waste such nice weather so my sister & her husband took the Phactors on an outing to Wakulla Springs and in addition to being a very pretty place there was a remarkable amount of wildlife on display: gaters, lots of birds (ibis, black vulture, egret, ducks, were dirt common), lots of turtles, lots of manatees. Here's a few pictures. The bird is a little blue heron, a new bird for us. TPP had only seen manatee once before; a first for Mrs. Phactor. Everyone down here says they're gater fans, and they do pose rather nicely on a sunny day, but the locals' love of gaters seems quite out of proportion. At any rate, Wakulla Springs was a great place to visit. Put it on your list to visit. Enjoy.

You may be a redneck if your backyard is a swamp

It had been way too long since TPP has visited his kid sister who lives in the pan handle of Florida. Now honestly, she is no more redneck than her older brother, yours truly, but she does have a swamp in her back yard. Actually it might be more accurate to call her backyard a wildlife refuge or conservation preserve. At any rate here is a view from more or less straight out the back door of my sister's house. Isn't this great?  Nothing quite like bald cypress.

Non-evolution in Florida

Nothing beats having the scientifically ignorant attempting to dictate science curricula, and you have to wonder if having politicians like Florida’s State Senator Stephen Wise's tinkering is the price you have to pay have public education? Did I have to say he’s GnOPe? Did I have to say the science he wants to tinker with is evolution? Is the educational background of most politicians weak on science? Does Wise look like an orangutan in a suit? Judge for yourself. Wise proposes very unwisely, but in a strangely honest manner that whenever evolution is taught, non-evolution should be taught. The curiously honest part of this is that sums up creationism and intelligent design in a single term: non-evolution. It consists of nothing but criticisms and doubts about the veracity of evolution, and of course, the corollary, if not evolution, then god. Game, set, and match.
As anyone who’s familiar with such proposals knows, the rationale is to teach critical thinking. Sure. And teaching the flat-Earth alternative promotes critical thinking too. Does Wise really want science teachers examining the evidence and underlying assumptions of “non-evolution”? Does Wise really want students to consider all the many creation stories? In an interview Wise asks “Why do we still have apes if we came from them?” Imagine the mind that actually thinks that’s a critical issue, a question that undermines evolution, a real challenge to answer. Ah, well. Dear Senator Wise, the modern apes and humans share common ancestors which explains why we share so many characteristics and about 98% of our DNA. Wise up.