Category: Enlightenment Warrior

This is a letter to the editor I published at the Daily Advance. Posted here for posterity, since they have no online archive: A recent letter criticizing the Currituck Board of Commissioners’ decision to relax zoning restrictions on tattoo parlors serves as yet another reminder of how quaintly behind the times we are here in…

Dr. Moran has essentially written one big justification for intellectual laziness in his post “Lessons from Science Communication Training,” where he rationalizes and credentializes away any social responsibility scientists have to educate and persuade the public. I can understand the political naivety I’m reading in this article; after all, natural scientists are notoriously out of…

This is a letter to the editor I published at the Daily Advance. Posted here for posterity, since they have no online archive: Robert Kelly-Goss’ recent column, where he argues the superiority of printed texts over their electronic counterparts, reminded me of a quote from author Douglas Adams: “Anything that is in the world when…

This is a letter to the editor I published at the Daily Advance. Posted here for posterity, since they have no online archive: North Dakota gets three Electoral College votes for its 642,200 residents, one vote for every 214,067 people. New York gets 33 votes for its 19,190,115 residents, one vote for every 581,519 people.…

“Climate is what we expect, weather is what we get.“ – Mark Twain Photo released by the Canadian Ice Service Friday Feb. 2, 2007 A DrudgeReport headline this fall read, “SUMMER 2006 TEMPS FAIL TO BREAK RECORD SET IN 1936.” Conservative blogs, like

This is a letter to the editor I published at the Daily Advance. Posted here for posterity, since they have no online archive: Prayer vigils and marches through Sawyertown are all well and good for combating Elizabeth City’s plague of drug abuse, but without providing real alternatives to this self-destructive lifestyle they are no more…

The following is an exchange between my brother and I concerning Intelligent Design VS Evolution, which spread into the areas of Religion VS Science. I think it’s an important exchange because it illustrates: 1. There is more than one version of Intelligent Design, and allowing one requires allowing them all. ID proponents need to consider…

This is a letter to the editor I published at the Daily Advance. Posted here for posterity, since they have no online archive: I am appreciating the irony of creationism expert Steve Grohman’s claim that science is “flawed” while enjoying the benefits of agricultural, medical and technological sciences that feed him, keep him in good…

This is a letter to the editor I published at the Daily Advance. Posted here for posterity, since they have no online archive: In response to Minnesota Rep.-elect Keith Ellison’s intention to swear his oath of office on the Koran, Virginia Rep. Virgil Goode recently wrote his constituents that to “preserve the values and beliefs…

This is a letter to the editor I published at the Daily Advance. Posted here for posterity, since they have no online archive: How ironic that an opinion survey on race relations would include the blatant sampling bias inherent in phone interviews. Families that are more financially well off own more phones per person, if…

This is a letter to the editor I published at the Daily Advance. Posted here for posterity, since they have no online archive: I was shocked to find a billboard outside the River Road Middle School voting station endorsing “Republican” judges. It is unsettling to think not only of all the right-wingers who took those…

Bishop Little Joe Powell Jr. said during an NAACP forum, “God made Adam and Eve. He didn’t make Adam and Steve.” This literal interpretation of Genesis may or may not be true, but God certainly did make Roy and Silo, two male penguins at New York’s Central Park Zoo who have been in a monogamous…