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Stories and comments across the archive that link to scienceblogs.com.

Comments · 763

  1. Don't be astroturfed: DDT is not banned by Nick+Barnes · · Score: 2, Informative · on DDT or Malaria -- Which is Worse?
    Widespread use of DDT for crop-spraying has lead to DDT-resistant mosquitos in many parts of the world. Despite this, and despite some other adverse effects, DDT is not banned. DDT is recommended by the WHO for residual indoor spraying as part of an anti-malaria campaign. Governments and NGOs fund residual indoor DDT spraying programs in many countries. However, for saving lives, DDT is far less effective than treated bed-nets, and each is less effective than an integrated anti-malaria campaign.

    For reasons best known to themselves, some parts of the blogosphere have taken up the meme "By banning DDT, environmentalists have caused the deaths of millions of people from malaria." Almost every aspect of this meme is false, as anyone can discover with a small amount of Googling. I can even save you the small amount of Googling by pointing you to Deltoid, the blog of someone who has done it for you. The "Rachel Carson was worse than Stalin" notion seems to have been started as an astroturf lobbying operation by DDT manfacturers, and spread by dittoheads. Some wingnut sites have counters suggesting that the death-toll is even billions, which just goes to show how innumerate some people are.

  2. Astroturf by uncleO · · Score: 2 · on DDT or Malaria -- Which is Worse?
    No discussion of DDT would be complete without a link to Tim Lambert's DDT page.

    Dr. Lambert has made a hobby of following DDT opponents' crazy theories, as well as the anti-global-warming crowd, and the Big Money that makes both possible. For a compact overview of DDT falsehoods, check out DDT ban myth bingo.

  3. Re:Do we need better models? by ankhank · · Score: 1 · on Research Over Tibet Gives Climate Insight

    It's good to look for sources, thanks for asking. Please give yours also.

    Here's a good general discussion responding to questions from one modeler to another:

    http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2005 /10/modeller-vs-modeller/

    Other relevant threads for your question -- a few in a quick grab-bag -- include:

    http://scienceblogs.com/stoat/2006/05/model_projec tions_of_the_north.php

    http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2006 /03/catastrophic-sea-level-rise-more-evidence-from -the-ice-sheets/

    http://www.jamstec.go.jp/frsgc/research/d5/jdannan /

    One of the fundamental predictions made 10 years ago by modeling that has been borne out in measurement is discussed here:

    http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2006 /01/polar-amplification/

    Most of the statements you make deserve footnotes, if you'll tell us where you got those ideas. It's very helpful to understand where these ideas come from -- not uncommonly, they can be traced back to websites of PR industry pages funded by industries trying to deny scientific work can be relied on (see the tobacco papers generally for fifty years of such material).

    Your basic idea that science starts only from observation, for example -- who says that and where? Why do you believe it's the only way science can be done? Do none of the scientists you personally know -- ask them! -- first think about things, then go look to see if they can disprove ("falsify") what they imagined might be true? Those I know work that way routinely.

    Science moves by self-correction. One example here:
    http://scienceblogs.com/stoat/2006/05/the_von_s_af fair.php

    Most of the questions you pose are in the 'can be looked up' realm; I'm just a reader of the science like you are, not a climate researcher myself. I recommend the reading. The books reviewed here
    http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2006 /05/my-review-of-books/
    may be helpful (all have extensive footnotes that can be looked up, most of the references are online).

  4. Re:Do we need better models? by ankhank · · Score: 1 · on Research Over Tibet Gives Climate Insight

    It's good to look for sources, thanks for asking. Please give yours also.

    Here's a good general discussion responding to questions from one modeler to another:

    http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2005 /10/modeller-vs-modeller/

    Other relevant threads for your question -- a few in a quick grab-bag -- include:

    http://scienceblogs.com/stoat/2006/05/model_projec tions_of_the_north.php

    http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2006 /03/catastrophic-sea-level-rise-more-evidence-from -the-ice-sheets/

    http://www.jamstec.go.jp/frsgc/research/d5/jdannan /

    One of the fundamental predictions made 10 years ago by modeling that has been borne out in measurement is discussed here:

    http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2006 /01/polar-amplification/

    Most of the statements you make deserve footnotes, if you'll tell us where you got those ideas. It's very helpful to understand where these ideas come from -- not uncommonly, they can be traced back to websites of PR industry pages funded by industries trying to deny scientific work can be relied on (see the tobacco papers generally for fifty years of such material).

    Your basic idea that science starts only from observation, for example -- who says that and where? Why do you believe it's the only way science can be done? Do none of the scientists you personally know -- ask them! -- first think about things, then go look to see if they can disprove ("falsify") what they imagined might be true? Those I know work that way routinely.

    Science moves by self-correction. One example here:
    http://scienceblogs.com/stoat/2006/05/the_von_s_af fair.php

    Most of the questions you pose are in the 'can be looked up' realm; I'm just a reader of the science like you are, not a climate researcher myself. I recommend the reading. The books reviewed here
    http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2006 /05/my-review-of-books/
    may be helpful (all have extensive footnotes that can be looked up, most of the references are online).

  5. MSNBC did the same thing with "Noah's Ark" by Creosote · · Score: 1 · on World's Largest Pyramid Discovered in Bosnia?

    P.Z. Myers complained not long ago about their idiotic gee-gosh-golly reporting of the umpteenth claim that the Ark has been located on Mt. Ararat (Sleuth closes in on Noah's Ark mystery").

  6. Re:Too True by Savantissimo · · Score: 3, Interesting · on Tilting At Windmills
    How are Mims' religious views relevant to this? It's more important that he has encouraged tens of thousands of people to do their own experiments and make their own scientific instruments. Mimms views on evolution are wrong, sure, but that does not affect his good scientific work in other fields.

    Your first link claimed he hadn't changed anything in Mims' letter, but in fact cut an unspecified amount, likely the more cogent part. At any rate it all has no bearing on the case at hand. Attacking the messenger is not a valid tactic.

    Your second link is an attempt at the old guilt-by-association argument - or perhaps even more tenuous. Something along the lines of "Al-jazeera reports on Bush and on al-Quaeda, therefore Bush is linked to Al-Quaeda"

    Your third link is to a TV station whose idea of invesigative reporting goes no further than asking Pianka if he wanted to kill everybody and then taking everything he says as unvarnished truth.

    Your fourth link is where you cribbed most of your post, and it is pure primate territorial display - "The wingnut echo chamber has recently gone insane ..HOOT HOOT AAH AAH THUMPTHUMP... IDers hate our freedoms... HOOT!. It's like the green version of O'Reilly.

    Here's a better link to someone proposing that Pinka didn't mean it:
    http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2006/04/pianka_ and_mims.php

    And here are a couple of first hand refutations in reply to that:

    I took Evolutionary Ecology from Dr. Pianka a few years ago. He'd frequently get sidetracked onto:

    1. Cool Australian lizards.
    2. His buffalo.
    3. How much he disliked his neighbors who kept killing rattlesnakes.
    4. How some horrible disease is going to wipe out huge chunks of the population any year now, and how pleased he will be when that happens.

    So, yep, sounds like Dr. Pianka to me. The quotes in the article all sound pretty familiar.

    Posted by: Tiger Spot | April 2, 2006 09:18 PM

    ***

    PZ,

    when I was at SUNY Stony Brook, Pianka gave a similar talk where he said the same offensive crap. What Tiger Spot said sounds right, except we got the 45 minute version. My recollection is that it didn't go over very well. He does know his lizards however.

    Posted by: Mike the Mad Biologist | April 2, 2006 09:44 PM


    So no, Pianka isn't likely to spread a virus but he is looking forward to the deaths of billions of people.

  7. Re:The problem of nerve impulse conduction by Ithika · · Score: 1 · on An Alternate Human

    No, he's questioning PZ Myers, an evo-devo professor.

  8. Also... by sevenoverzero · · Score: 1 · on An Alternate Human

    Pharyngula, PZ Myers's blog, is good reading.

  9. Re:Not clear-cut, sadly. by slarabee · · Score: 1 · on Most Primitive Snake Fossil Discovered
    Could you please point me to, or directly quote from the bit in the article which states there are sea snake fossils nine million years older than Najash rionegrina. Multiple readings of the linked article and I just can not find it. Does kind of pull the rug out from under your next seven paragraphs.

    Nice article and discussion on this over at Pharyngula.

    Been a good couple of weeks for well publicized transitionals.

  10. Re:Matter of time by plunge · · Score: 5, Interesting · on Study Explains Evolution's Molecular Advance

    That was actually the subject of this great, award winning blog post on Pharyngula:

    "The proper reverence due those who have gone before"
    http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2006/01/the_pro per_reverence_due_those.php

  11. Re:First thing that came to mind. by plunge · · Score: 1 · on Missing Link Fossil Discovered

    http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/upload/2006/04/ embrace_your_inner_fish.jpg

    Awwwwww.....

  12. The thing most interesting to me about this by mcc · · Score: 4, Insightful · on Missing Link Fossil Discovered
    This was a predicted, sought find. This wasn't just like, some people found a fossil and was like "wow! this fills the gap in a missing link between reptiles and fish!". They set out to find something like this, targeted the most likely places in which to find it, and actually found what they were looking for. A quote of a Ahlberg and Clack article from the Pharyngula blog (lots of information there):
    First, it demonstrates the predictive capacity of palaeontology. The Nunavut field project had the express aim of finding an intermediate between Panderichthys and tetrapods, by searching in sediments from the most probable environment (rivers) and time (early Late Devonian). Second, Tiktaalik adds enormously to our understanding of the fish-tetrapod transition because of its position on the tree and the combination of characters it displays.
    I think that's just neat.
  13. As amusing as cyber insects might be... by sevenoverzero · · Score: 1 · on This Week's Government Cyborg Animal

    Massively negative commentary from good ol' PZ.