In "Rat Out a Church.org"

mk1gti, I had exactly the same reaction when I first loaded the page. I just assumed this was in regard to right-wing churches. BTW, here is a church you could rat out for getting involved with politics.

In "An optical illusion"

I just happened to be at the Exploratorium this weekend, where they had a life-sze (i.e. 5-ft tall) poster of this same illusion, along with a number of others by scientist Akiyoshi Kitaoka. He uses these in his study of vision. There are many more illusions at his site.

In "What kind of Target merchandise is this?"

So, is this a product, or a service?

In "Creationists will breed themselves into the majority."

oops, ... what they've been taught ...

Yes, because "creationism" is an dominant, immutable, inherited trait C'mon, DNA is not the only thing we pass along to our children. Being indoctrinated with certain "facts" during your upbringing is going to have a profound impact on what you believe as an adult. If one of my kids were taken and raised in the home of an evangelical Christian, I wouldn't be counting on their "California" gene to kick in at some point and for them to start questioning what they've taught their whole life.

In "Corey Feldman is back!"

For those of us who showed up after the link was disabled, would somebody summarize what this link did?

In "Espionage out in the open.....sorta. "

jb: Apparently, the guy who got tons of cash from Wilco for using his sample likely got that sample from someone else, for free. That makes him a slimebag, for not offering to at least share the settlement. He recorded the sound himself off of the shortwave radio. Wilco lifter the sample without permission, and so they got sued. If they had just asked, like Cameron Crowe had, they may have gotten permission for free. The guy spent years researching these stations, and listening to the radio trying to find when the stations popped up. He then had to filter through all of the recordings he had made in order to decide which ones to publish. This took a considerable amount of time (== money). Wilco could have done that themselves, but they decided to just lift a track without permission, so they have to pay. Given that, and seeing that he lets anybody download these tracks freely for non-commercial purposes, I'd hardly call him a slimebag.

In "51% Bush and 49% Kerry makes..."

I thought I could detect just a bit of Nader around the ears.

In "A Modest Proposal from the Right..."

Don't forget Hawaii. Hah, we get Hawaii. Neener, neener, neener...

Jesusland (via mofi)

In "The Day After."

Fes: By way of comfort to the majority of Mofites, I profer this: regardless of what happens in the next four years, you can be assured that Bush will NOT be elected in '08. Well maybe not this particular Bush, but don't forget about Jeb. Otherwise, well said Fes. I'd like to be able to view this in perspective, as you have, but it's hard. The sun did rise today, so that's a start.

In "This pamphlet,"

(And you would have gotten away with it, too, if it weren't for those meddling monkeys!)

In "Kerry gets an endorsement he might not want."

fuyugare: Bush has use 9/11 as a pretext to attack Iraq, at the expense of devoting attention to actually reducing the threat of terrorism. I have not heard a credible case for how the war in Iraq has reduced the threat of terrorism; but it almost certainly has turned into a massive al qaeda recruiting drive. Because Kerry is calling Bush on this does not mean that he sees the capture of OBL as the only goal in the war on terrorism. You're right, Gore would probably not even have attempted this war, and we'd all be better off for it.

In "Poor planning, air strikes by coalition forces and a "climate of violence" have led to more than 100,000 extra deaths in Iraq, scientists say"

This was a statistical analysis comparing death rates before and during the occupation. I'm not sure what they report as the margin of error. I heard the author of the study on the radio, and he said that he'd like to see a more comprehensive study once the situation in Iraq has stabalized.

In "Your prognostication please: "

Bush: 268 Kerry: 266 An anxious nation watches into the wee hours of Wednesday morning to see which way the 4 votes in Hawaii are going to swing. Each candidate has 49.5% of the vote. Things are even murkier by Wednesday evening, as Oahu has sunk into the Pacific, straining from the additional weight of all the lawyers flying into to challenge the results.

In "Bill Clinton to run for UN Secretary-General. "

I had thought for a while that Clinton would make a great U.S. Secretary of State, but Secretary General is an interesting possibility as well.

In "Chief Justice William Rehnquist had been hospitalized for treatment of thyroid cancer"

mecurious: Could a confirmation by Congress with a Republican majority take place before Holiday Break? Rehnquist: I'm not dead yet...

In "They all look the same to me!"

7/18: average. It would be interesting to see how the results compare to a random distribution. I mean, even with 1000 monkeys tapping out random answers, you'd get some monkeys who were "really good" at recognizing faces, others that were "hopeless", and most would be "average". You'd expect the average to be 6 in that case. Since the average for us humans is 7 instead of 6, that means were just one better than the monkeys.

In "A-carving"

When I saw this, I first thought it was a follow-up to this thread.

In "Jacques Derrida, RIP"

How to Deconstruct Almost Anything: A how-to guide for aspiring deconstructionists.

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