This seems a little hard to credit at first blush, but a report from somebody called the Cooperative Research Centre for Spatial Information is claiming that lack of open access to spatial information might have cost the Australian GDP about 7%. Damn. Here’s Open Access New reporting on the subject.

PZ Myers is a biologist-blogger-creationism-debunker. Last week he went with his family and a friend to a screening of Expelled, which is some kind of pro intelligent design documentary. Before he got in, he was pulled out of the line by rent-a-cops and told to leave the premises. Yes, a biologist so dangerous he must be expelled.

But that’s not the funny part. Read his post to find out the funny part.

There’s something compelling about this map of the walking paths of the Apollo 11 astronauts on moon, superimposed on a baseball diamond for scale.

Like, they were really there walking around on the holy crap moon.

A bit. They didn’t go very far. If I was on a brand new world I wouldn’t go far from the car either.

Dean Bavington is a prof at the School of Natural Resources. He co-teaches one of my classes this semester. I’m not sure exactly how to describe what he studies, some kind of science studies/science philosophy thing with an emphasis on cod. Interesting guy with interesting ideas, sure enough.

His episode is available at the CBC. I haven’t heard it yet, but I started listening to earlier episodes in anticipation and they’re good, especially #1, with Simon Schaffer.

What the hell? Why did we just fire our national science adviser?

All politics, no science, for Harper — Toronto Star

And why, when somebody asked about it in parliment, did the response come from Jim Prentice, the industry minister?

Has science recently become less relevant to policy? Did having somebody around to do high-level non-partisan synthesis of policy-relevant science just suddenly seem like an expensive luxury?

Well, here’s what Minister Prentice had to, uh, say:

Industry Minister Jim Prentice rose to respond. “Under the science and technology strategy which this government has put forward, there is an intent to focus the science and technology strategy to harness more resources.”

Sweet jesus, what language is he speaking? I’m terrifed that it might be english.

Here’s Adam Bly of Seed on the topic:

Canada’s Future

This cross-genre rant is great. Evolutionary programming to design physical objects never ceases to entertain me. Add in a Mr. Furious-ANGRY anti-intelligent design rant, plus some truly stupid animation humour, and you have a uncomfortable and (I think) hilarious one-of-a-kinder.

“The clock genome is a matrix containing the information of who binds to who and what their properties are.

Remember, the theory of evolution is NOT abiogenesis.

Arguing that because I wrote this program and I am intelligent somehow proves intelligent design is being incredibly ignorant.

IF the purpose of this simulation was to test abiogensis then you would have a point but it’s not so you don’t.”

You’ve read all the front-page headlines so you know by now that it’s the 50th anniversary of Lego (give or take a few days). Oh man, hurray! Over at Boing Boing Gadgets, Joel has a list of the 9 lego sets he lusted over most. I remember pining over 7 to 9 too, but I totally had numbers 1 and 2! For a while my folks had a Christmas tradition of tagging the biggest gift as being “from Santa” and parking it in plain sight in front of the tree. I remember coming down to find the #375 castle awaiting me. I also remember my parents reflecting on being up all christmas-eve-night putting the 779 pieces together. I don’t think either they or I really took the santa concept very seriously.

I’m also pretty stoked that this year (give or take a year) is the 40th anniversary of Logo. Logo is a programming language–in fact a legitmate derivative of Lisp, the most revered of computer languages–but they didn’t tell us elementary school students that when we used it. They cleverly told us it was an art tool. I used it extensively for my art-ucation on our family’s Franklin Ace 1000, the Icons at school, and one heady summer when my dad brought an Icon back from his shcool and let me keep it in my bedroom. A computer in my bedroom! It sat next to my lego bins. I don’t use lego very much in my daily life, but I’m still using a version of logo for my graduate research today. I like that.

This video from the Logothings website is great:

Hey look, them kids are hacking in lisp!

The Sliding Rocks of Racetrack Playa

It’s like a highschool physics question that was never intended to be more than hypothetically abstract brought to life at grand scale.

One of the most interesting mysteries of Death Valley National Park is the sliding rocks at Racetrack Playa (a playa is a dry lake bed). These rocks can be found on the floor of the playa with long trails behind them. Somehow these rocks slide across the playa, cutting a furrow in the sediment as they move.

Mind boggling. On the one hand, it seems wildly improbably that a combination of utter flatness, utter slipperiness, sufficient wind, and the presence of a few, isolated objects would come together just so to make the phenomenon possible. Especially if you accept that some of these rocks are 100s of pounds. On the other hand, if it does happen at racetrack playa, it seems improbable that the conditions are so exquisitely specific that they’ve never come together anywhere else.

And no one has ever seen it happening?

Just so we’re all clear on this point, Line Beauchamp, the Environment Minister for Quebec, will be representing myself and the other Canadians at the Bali climate change conference next week. We’re also sending Prime Minister Harper, but he’s just there for comic effect. To be a portly Canadian Shriner in a fez tootling behind the American bandwagon on a pint-sized scooter, if you will. Don’t for god’s sake take anything he says seriously, especially if it’s regarding any issue with substantial consequence, such as global warming.

Two good stories:

The passing of a Yellowstone Cinderella, High Country News

“She was one of the original 31 Canadian wolves transplanted to Yellowstone to kick off the wolf restoration effort in the Northern Rockies. Much of the park’s spectacular wolf recovery can be attributed to her breeding success: At least three of her daughters have gone on to form their own packs. And not only was she the alpha female of the largest wolf pack ever recorded — the Druid pack numbered 37 wolves in 2000 — but she also contributed mightily to our knowledge of wolf behavior and pack dynamics.
….
Doug Smith, the Wolf Project biologist for Yellowstone, says, “None of the other wolves liked 40 so they would hang out with 42 instead. In fact, the only wolf to visit 40’s den was 21.” When the aggressive 40 threatened her sister again, Smith said, “This time 42 said, ‘forget it’ and attacked 40, defending her pups. At least two other wolves joined in and left 40 a bloody mess.”
….
The next day 42 moved her pups clear across the Lamar Valley, took over 40’s den and raised her sister’s pups along with her own. She quickly assumed the alpha role, which she held until her untimely death this winter.”

Jump the Shark, New York Times, about the demise of professional pool sharking.

“But that’s just gambling,” Mr. Bell says wistfully. “Real hustling — driving to a pool room in another state, walking in, setting the trap, busting the local guy and then heading to a new town — is different. That’s what ain’t there any more.”