Miscellaneous Heathen : Archives for May 2008

That's great, man, but it's not like Lucas could fuck up Star Wars MORE now, is it?

Sat, 31 May 2008 17:22:00 -0500

Harrison Ford, in answer to the unasked "now that you've shat all over Indy, will you do the same to Han?" question, says no more Star Wars.

Dept. of Wacky Chemistry

Sat, 31 May 2008 17:20:00 -0500

NYT: A Tiny Fruit That Tricks The Tongue:

CARRIE DASHOW dropped a large dollop of lemon sorbet into a glass of Guinness, stirred, drank and proclaimed that it tasted like a “chocolate shake.”

Nearby, Yuka Yoneda tilted her head back as her boyfriend, Albert Yuen, drizzled Tabasco sauce onto her tongue. She swallowed and considered the flavor: “Doughnut glaze, hot doughnut glaze!”

They were among 40 or so people who were tasting under the influence of a small red berry called miracle fruit at a rooftop party in Long Island City, Queens, last Friday night. The berry rewires the way the palate perceives sour flavors for an hour or so, rendering lemons as sweet as candy.

The "magic" substance in the berries is a protein called -- we're not making this up -- "miraculin", which we think is hilarious. Get us some.

The Stupid! It Burns!

Sat, 31 May 2008 17:17:00 -0500

In Utah, there's a move afoot to make it a crime for a teacher to answer unapproved questions in sex ed.

No idea how long this will stay true, but it's cool anyway

Sat, 31 May 2008 17:16:00 -0500

There are still tribes in the Amazon with no contact with the outside world.

Just go read it

Sat, 31 May 2008 17:15:00 -0500

What Every American Should Know About the Middle East. Some highlights:

It's not a homogeneous region; sectarian and ethnic divisions abound. Sunni are not Shia; Arabs are not Persians.
Iraq is predominately Arab and Shia, but Saddam and his ruling party were from the Sunni minority.
Iran is NOT Arab and is almost exclusively Shia.
Palestine, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Syria, and Jordan are Sunni and Arab

Special bonus fact that makes the invasion of Iraq even more obviously stupid: Al Qaeda is a Sunni group.

MLB: Still douchebags

Sat, 31 May 2008 16:52:00 -0500

They're suing Chicago little leagues for using team names in common with MLB teams. Not logos; just the names; MLB is insisting they own the idea of a baseball team named, for example, the Giants, or Tigers, and that in order to use those names the little leagues must buy their uniforms from MLB's much more expensive provider. Gee, thanks.

Fortunately, Techdirt and Stephen Colbert are on the case.

YES.

Fri, 30 May 2008 15:00:00 -0500

Dear Intarwub: Please make for us one of these.

Creepiest Thing EVAR

Fri, 30 May 2008 11:55:00 -0500

Apparently, the oldest mamallian cell line is a transmissable canine tumor spread sexually. Yup: this means it's an immortal, cancerous STD. Yikes.

Unlike most other contagious cancers such as cervical cancer in humans, CTVT isn't spread by a virus but (as recently proved) by cancerous cells themselves. Genetic analysis suggests the tumor originated in an individual wolf or domesticated dog, probably in east Asia, between 200 and 2,500 years ago. This long-dead canid's much-mutated cells are still alive and being passed along during coitus (or sometimes through casual contact) centuries later, making it the longest-lived mammalian cell line known.

Mmmm, snarkalicious

Wed, 28 May 2008 16:59:00 -0500

Mohney provides three three-word reviews of "Crystal Skull:"

"Big dumb puppy"
"Jar Jar Lebeouf"
"I miss Nazis"

All spot on.

Dept. of Picturism

Wed, 28 May 2008 16:11:00 -0500

While you weren't lookin', I took a bunch of pictures.

From May 10, The Art Car Parade; and
From last week in Albany, FirstNiece Washes The Car

Enjoy.

Billion-dollar onanism

Mon, 26 May 2008 23:11:00 -0500

We used one of our spaceships on Mars to take a picture of another of our spaceships on Mars.

Dept. of Crap You Might Want

Mon, 26 May 2008 23:06:00 -0500

Did you know that Leatherman makes a multitool that lacks a knife, explicitly so it can be carried aboard planes? (Actual Leatherman.com page here.)

It totally sucks that our TSA can't screw up this way

Mon, 26 May 2008 23:05:00 -0500

The Japanese police hid a bunch of dope in some random traveler's bags and then turned loose the dogs to train them -- and then lost the hash. Score!

Well, damn.

Mon, 26 May 2008 21:33:00 -0500

Sydney Pollack is dead at 73.

To be honest, I'm not sure if I should be proud of this or not

Sat, 24 May 2008 10:12:22 -0500

The Heathen Alma Mater figures into this list of the largest football stadiums in the US. Amusingly, only one is a pro facility.

Finally

Fri, 23 May 2008 22:24:00 -0500

At long last, the official HeathenPix for the 2008 Art Car parade. Enjoy.

Longer form review of Crystal Skull

Fri, 23 May 2008 09:18:00 -0500

Spielberg, apparently jealous of the way in which his buddy Lucas was able to completely destroy a film legacy with three new films, does his level best to shit all over Indy in a single, derivative, bloating, and limping sequel comprised largely of elements stolen from the X-Files, the 2nd Mummy film, and misplaced fifties nostalgia. For the most part, he succeeds.

Stay away.

You should really check this out

Wed, 21 May 2008 16:35:00 -0500

This guy does high-quality paintings based on children's drawings. The effect is deeply odd. (Via MeFi.)

American Airlines is committing suicide

Wed, 21 May 2008 16:33:00 -0500

They announced today that they would begin charging $15 for the first checked bag from any passenger.

Juking the Stats

Tue, 20 May 2008 10:01:00 -0500

There's a new educational notion floating around called "Minimum 50 grading," the gist of which is that any numerical grade lower than a 50 is "rounded up" to 50. This is so stupid it makes my head hurt; John Gruber has more. From the story:

"It's a classic mathematical dilemma: that the students have a six times greater chance of getting an F," says Douglas Reeves, founder of The Leadership and Learning Center, a Colorado-based educational think tank who has written on the topic. "The statistical tweak of saying the F is now 50 instead of zero is a tiny part of how we can have better grading practices to encourage student performance."

But opponents say the larger gap between D and F exists because passing requires a minimum competency of understanding at least 60% of the material. Handing out more credit than a student has earned is grade inflation, says Ed Fields, founder of HotChalk.com, a site for teachers and parents: "I certainly don't want to teach my children that no effort is going to get them half the way there."

Reeves, as Gruber points out, is either incredibly stupid or incredibly craven here, especially with his line about students having a "six times greater chance of getting an F." Um, no. Grades aren't random; they reflect classroom work, pedagogy, and effort. Students are not six times more likely to get an F than some other grade (obviously! in a class with 10 students passing, do 60 students fail, on average?).

I'm not insane. I understand that, with sufficiently low grades, a student may be doomed to failure by mid-semester. But a grade is supposed to show, roughly speaking, percentage mastery of the subject. What sort of lesson are we teaching if showing up, literally, guarantees half credit? The only reason for policies like this seems to be improving passing rates -- but, like the post title says, it's not real. It's juking the stats -- a methodological hip-check to the pinball machine of education that results in shiny numbers with no corresponding increase in actual education.

Yes, I know the feed is broken.

Mon, 19 May 2008 17:07:00 -0500

No fucking idea. Typo sucks ass. Moving again soon. Sorry.

You've got to be kidding me

Mon, 19 May 2008 11:15:00 -0500

Wordpress author Matt Mullenweg is apparently an enormous idiot, as he just lost nearly of TWENTY THOUSAND BUCKS worth of camera equipment when it was stolen from his checked baggage. His list:

Nikon D3 (Amazon: about $5K)
Nikkor 85mm f/1.4D IF (Amazon: about $1K)
Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8G ED (Amazon: about $2100)
Leica M8 (Amazon: about $5400)
Leica 50mm f/1.0 Noctilux (B&H: about $6K)
Cards, cases, etc.

Quickie total: $19,500. In his luggage. My first thought was "Wow, writing free software must pay really well, Matt." My second was "holy crap, that's the dumbest move I've heard of in weeks." Checking valuables was a stupid idea pre-9/11; it's grounds for a mini-Darwin award now. Maybe next time, Matt will check some bearer bonds or untraceable gold bullion; I'm sure those will be just as safe.

It occurs to me that perhaps the trusting attitude revealed here is one reason WordPress has such a terrible security reputation; clearly, Mullenweg places abundant trust in untrustworthy institutions. Perhaps his code behaves likewise. It is my sincere hope that his post -- helpfully titled "Don't Check Your Valuables" -- is the first in a series dedicated to informing his readers when he encounters these sorts of life-lessons. I eagerly await follow-ups like "Don't Buy A Car That's On Fire" and "That Man In Nigeria Won't Really Send You Any Money."

Life == Art in the best possible way

Sun, 18 May 2008 20:20:00 -0500

Step 1: Achewood, April 28, 2006

Step 2: Wired News, May 16, 2008

This is how we see if Mohney still reads Heathen

Sun, 18 May 2008 20:18:00 -0500

Pajiba:

And as it all that weren’t enough, news also came down this week that Nicolas Cage will star in a remake of Bad Lieutenant (holy shit) directed by Werner Herzog (holy shit). Pressman Film Corp. will produce the updated edition of its original, which was directed by Abel Ferrara and starred Harvey Keitel as the titular bad lieutenant. Who knows what direction Herzog will take the picture; maybe he’ll have Cage ride around L.A. on a grizzly bear.

Wow. Just wow.

Sun, 18 May 2008 20:09:00 -0500

Rafe Colburn says it best: Tobacco companies more evil than you thought:

Tobacco companies found themselves facing the need to argue that some of the scientific evidence used to support laws banning smoking in public places is “junk science“, but quickly realized that a campaign focused on tobacco-related research would be dismissed as transparently self-serving. So they instead spent their money to a create propaganda campaign that attacked scientific research on many fronts, including research that supported smoking bans. The end result? The execrable Web site JunkScience.com. I’m sure John Stossel fits in here somewhere as well.

Dept. of Things that will make some of you plotz

Sun, 18 May 2008 18:18:00 -0500

Tricia "6" Helfer is starring opposite Leelee Sobieski in a new comedy/thriller called Walk All Over Me. In it, Helfer plays a dominatrix.

Granted, this isn't exactly NEWS

Sat, 17 May 2008 17:16:00 -0500

Susan Jacobs: The Dumbing of America.

This is the last subject that any candidate would dare raise on the long and winding road to the White House. It is almost impossible to talk about the manner in which public ignorance contributes to grave national problems without being labeled an "elitist," one of the most powerful pejoratives that can be applied to anyone aspiring to high office. Instead, our politicians repeatedly assure Americans that they are just "folks," a patronizing term that you will search for in vain in important presidential speeches before 1980. (Just imagine: "We here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain . . . and that government of the folks, by the folks, for the folks, shall not perish from the earth.") Such exaltations of ordinariness are among the distinguishing traits of anti-intellectualism in any era.

The classic work on this subject by Columbia University historian Richard Hofstadter, "Anti-Intellectualism in American Life," was published in early 1963, between the anti-communist crusades of the McCarthy era and the social convulsions of the late 1960s. Hofstadter saw American anti-intellectualism as a basically cyclical phenomenon that often manifested itself as the dark side of the country's democratic impulses in religion and education. But today's brand of anti-intellectualism is less a cycle than a flood. If Hofstadter (who died of leukemia in 1970 at age 54) had lived long enough to write a modern-day sequel, he would have found that our era of 24/7 infotainment has outstripped his most apocalyptic predictions about the future of American culture.

Dear Intarwub

Sat, 17 May 2008 17:01:00 -0500

Please buy us this car. KTHXBI.

Awesome

Sat, 17 May 2008 17:00:00 -0500

Chicago has abandoned its wrongheaded foie gras ban.

Dept. of Smackdowns

Sat, 17 May 2008 11:47:00 -0500

Check this out; Chris Matthews lays a serious ass-whuppin' on right-wingnut radio goon Kevin James. At issue? James was all about calling Obama an appeaser in the tradition of Chamberlain, but it turns out James really has no idea what ol' Neville actually did. Chris notices this, and does not let up. It's beautiful.