August 26th, 2011

politics

Delicious LiveJournal Links for 8-26-2011

  • Case closed: “Climategate” was manufactured | Bad Astronomy | Discover Magazine
    A couple of the report conclusions are worth pointing out: We found no basis to conclude that the [Climategate] emails were evidence of research misconduct or that they pointed to such evidence. That’s clear enough, I think. They also said: There is no specific evidence that [Mann] falsified or fabricated any data and no evidence that his actions amounted to research misconduct. A big claim by the deniers is that researchers were using "tricks" to falsify conclusions about global warming, but the NSF report is pretty clear that’s not true. The most damning thing the investigators could muster was that there was "some concern" over the statistical methods used, but that’s not scandalous at all; there’s always some argument in science over methodology. The vague language of the report there indicates to me this isn’t a big deal, or else they would’ve been specific. The big point is that the data were not faked.
    (tags: climatechange)
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Pronouncing "chair" and "charity"

Poll #1772972 Margaret Atwood's accent
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All. Participants: 115

"Chair" is the first syllable of "charity".

View Answers
Yes
16(14.2%)
No
97(85.8%)


(Inspired by Chapter 19 of The Handmaid's Tale: "I sit in the chair and think about the word chair. It can also mean the leader of a meeting. It can also mean a mode of execution. It is the first syllable in charity. It is the French word for flesh. None of these facts has any connection with the others.")