Denialism

Month: September 2008

  • Skeptics’ Circle Time

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    MarkH
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    The 95th addition is up at Skeptimedia—go and learn!

  • A million is getting closer

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    MarkH
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    Teh Overlordz have demanded some link love and a reminder that the one million mark is coming up. That means swag, celebration, and song (OK, maybe no singing). The SE Michigan get-together is still a-plannin’ (meaning I haven’t decided what place to tell people to show up yet). I’m hoping I can get Orac into…

  • Another anniversary

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    MarkH
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    I fear for this anniversary. Like everyone else, my memories of 9/11 are vivid. It is a shared experience for Americans, but as time goes on, it is losing its shared meaning. Some of this meaning will, I’m sure, continue to be shunted into political ends, even more so with the election coming up. I…

  • Crankish Signs from the Tree Sitters

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    Chris
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    All, I’m sorry for abusing you with posts concerning the Berkeley Tree Sitters. For those of us at UC, this has been an enduring pain. And it’s been embarrassing. Why? In part, because this is the type of rhetoric common to the debate: And of course… I promise, this is the last posting on the…

  • So, would you do it again?

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    MarkH
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    (I felt Doctor Signout deserved a more complete answer, so here it is.) I’m surrounded by cynicism. Doctors make particularly good cynics (although not always the best skeptics). Why are we cynics? Pehaps because we see human behavior in the raw. On a daily—no, hourly—basis, we see people making decisions that destory their bodies. People…

  • Berkeley Tree Sitters Come Down

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    Chris
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    It’s been an exciting day here at UC Berkeley. Four helicopters have been buzzing the office since about 8 AM, because the UC decided to erect a scaffold around the lone tree left in order to extricate the tree sitters. I got to watch about 12:00 today. There were probably 400 observers for the final…

  • Berkeley Tree Sitters Shake Down UC for $6M!

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    Chris
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    The nerve! Carolyn Jones of the Chronicle reports: In their most recent demand, the tree-sitters said they would come down if the university gives $6 million to environmental and Native American groups, creates a public committee on campus land use and allows protesters to use the stump from the oldest tree in the grove, which…

  • Million Comment Party

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    MarkH
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    So, due to circumstances beyond his control, Ed over at Dispatches won’t be able to plan our Michigan party, so we’re going to do it in the Detroit metro area on Saturday, Sept. 20th. I don’t have the place yet, but I’m getting the idea that there are a few definite maybes. Let me know…

  • How will the candidates fix American health care?

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    MarkH
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    I don’t know. There was a pretty good piece in the New England Journal of Medicine, but it’s really not clear enough for most readers (including myself). The McCain and Obama websites give fairly comprehensive looks at their health plans, but nothing useful for a lay reader. The good news is that both campaigns have…

  • Small family, big family

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    MarkH
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    Like many Jewish families, tracing our history is often a sad and difficult task. Three of my four grandparents escaped Europe to found new families in America, giving me the illusion of having a small family, as Hitler uprooted and burnt the rest of my family tree. But the networks formed by immigrants were close,…