…is trying to decode death. Though, in reading, it’s more complicated than the headline. I heard him speak at a space conference a few years ago, interesting guy. And I’m fascinated by the hostility from his fellow scientists.
All posts by Rand Simberg
Historical Physics
Why do we spend so much time teaching it?
To me, understanding how we developed the knowledge is key to understanding the science itself.
The Cold Civil War
Kurt Schichter is afraid it’s about to get hot. But there is this difference:
Sally Kohn, a CNN commentator perfectly personifies the left’s combination of utter cluelessness and utter certainty in its own moral superiority. Drawing from her bottomless well of stupidity, she recently became infamous for wishcasting about what happens “[s]traight forward from here.” Her scenario starts with Step 1 (“Impeach Trump & Pence”) and ends with Step 6 (“President Hillary”), thanks to a Constitutional process she created herself by blending ignorance, fascism, and wanting.
Sally, however, overlooked Step 2.5, where several dozen million Americans defend the Constitution by taking out their black rifles and saying, “Oh, hell no.” I assume the patriots determined to protect the Union would be confronted, for a short and awkward time, by a pro-coup hipster army locked and loaded with vinyl LPs, participation trophies and unearned self-regard.
There’s no reason not to believe that for these seditious Democrats, the second time will be the charm.
Democrats always get angry and violent when Republicans threaten to emancipate their slaves.
CAFE
Automakers ask Pruitt to roll back the Obama rules on mileage.
CAFE should be repealed, period. Also federal toilet-tank standards, and light-bulb laws. The federal government has no business whatsoever telling us what how efficient our personal items should be.
Trump And The Judge
I’m no Trump fan, but I think all the pearl clutching from the media over his “so-called judge” tweet was ridiculous. So does Jonathan Turley. And as always, it’s particularly ridiculous coming from people who probably had no problem with Obama upbraiding (and in the process lying) the Justices who had honored him with their attendance at the State of the Union over Citizens United.
Cancer
…as a metabolic disease. A long but interesting essay.
At least the community is starting to wake up to the hazards of sugar. I’ve seen a proposal to make food stamps ineligible for items containing it. Makes sense to me. It could help a lot with the obesity epidemic.
[Update a few minutes later]
Related thoughts from Glenn Reynolds.
[Update a few more minutes later]
Health authorities continue to fail us:
Considering the above, no one in their right mind would take any kind of dietary advice provided by the authorities at face value. It’s little wonder then that so many are taking matters into their own hands. Thirty years ago, if the USDA, AHA, or AMA told you something was bad for you, you stopped eating it. You didn’t question, because they were the ones with credibility and years of study. It was simply too much trouble for the average person to find the information they needed. Thankfully with the internet, all of the information needed is now available to anyone who wants it. We no longer have to put blind trust in authority figures because we can sift through the information ourselves and ask the right questions. If anything, the glut of information shows that the public’s trust in nutrition advice given by the authorities and media was sorely misplaced.
Same thing with climate, for the same reasons: there’s a lot of public policy, and money, at stake.
The Enemy Of My Enemy
This post is related to this one. I agree with Ben Shapiro:
Unfortunately, many conservatives have embraced this sort of binary thinking: If it angers the Left, it must be virtuous. Undoubtedly, that’s a crude shorthand for political thinking. It means you never have to check the ideas of the speaker, you merely have to check how people respond to him.
That’s dangerous. It leads to supporting bad policies and bad men. The enemy of your enemy isn’t always your friend. Sometimes he’s your enemy. Sometimes he’s just a dude sitting there minding his own business.
You don’t have enough information to know.
The logic of “if he melts snowflakes, he’s one of us” actually hands power to the Left, by allowing leftists to define conservatives’ friends. It gets to choose whom we support. This isn’t speculative. It happened during the 2016 primaries, when the media attacked Trump incessantly, driving Republicans into his outstretched arms. The media’s obvious hatred for Trump was one of the chief arguments for Trump from his advocates: If, as his detractors claimed, he wasn’t conservative, then why would the leftist media hate him so much?
And yes, many of Trump’s policies are bad, and he is in many ways a bad man. I’m glad she lost, but I don’t have to be glad he won, and because I was never a supporter, I don’t have to reflexively defend everything he does, though I will in fact defend him when the attack is unfair.
Read the whole thing.
[Thursday-morning update]
How Trump could create a Republican split. Or lovefest.
BTW, I’ve never predicted that the Senate would remove Trump. Just that, unlike her, it could.
The Media
Trump is beating it at its own game.
I’m glad someone finally is, but I wish it were someone both more knowledgable and less childish. It’s possible to play that game without being him. I could certainly do it.
[Update a few minutes later]
Related: Trump haters: Do these two thought experiments. I can easily imagine the latter, and would vastly prefer it. Though I’d prefer him with policies less economically ignorant.
The Father Of Cryonics
…never really died. A brief bio of Bob Ettinger.
Of course, it’s worth noting that cryonicists do believe that patients in suspension aren’t dead. That only occurs after information death (as occurs rotting in a grave, or being cremated).
Climate Models
…are flawed. That’s putting it mildly:
Professor Curry said: “It’s not just the fact that climate simulations are tuned that is problematic. It may well be that it is impossible to make long-term predictions about the climate – it’s a chaotic system after all. If that’s the case, then we are probably trying to redesign the global economy for nothing”.
I’ve been saying that’s likely the case for years. I’ll look forward to reading her paper.