Episode #111

News Items

    Interview with Bill Nye the Science Guy

    • 1) His website is: www.nyelabs.com/

      2) Here is his Wikipedia entry: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Nye

      3) Here is a link to the Bill Nye gets Booed entry from 2006: attebury.wordpress.com/2006/04/07/bill-nye-angers-some-creationists-during-lecture/

      4) Here is his Planetary Society’s website. Bill is the VP and he’s on the BOD: www.planetary.org/about/bill_nye.html

      5) Here is his ‘Ask Bill Nye’ page, courtesy of Encarta: encarta.msn.com/encnet/features/columns/?article=BN_fingernails

      6) He hosts(ed) the Science Channel’s ‘100 Greatest Discoveries’: science.discovery.com/convergence/100discoveries/hostbio/billnye.html

      7) Here is an article about the sun dial on Mars (back in 2003): www.astrobio.net/news/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=625

      8) POI interviewed Bill Nye in 2006: www.centerforinquiry.net/forums/viewthread/577/

      9) And he was part of a CNN interview with Larry ‘suspenders’ King in January 2007: http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0701/31/lkl.01.html

    Myth Busting Woes

    • Here’s a link to a fascinating — if depressing — article summarizing several studies which seem to indicate that humans have a tendency to remember frequently-repeated myths as true, even if they were repeated in the context of debunking them! I thought of you folks when I read the article’s final sentence: ‘Myth-busters, in other words, have the odds against them.’
      www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/09/03/AR2007090300933.html?nav%3Dhcmodule&sub=AR

      Scott Knickelbine
      Madison, WI

    Science or Fiction

    • Item #1 Science

      For the first time, astronomers have connected radio telescopes in real time from around the world to create a functional radio telescope with the diameter of the earth.

    • Item #2 Fiction

      Geneticists were surprised to discover a gene identical in mice and humans, but absent in all other primates.

    • Item #3 Science

      Cancer scientists have developed a way to detect metastasis anywhere in the body simply by examining one vein in the arm or cheek.

    Skeptical Quote of the Week.