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“Science is nothing more than the sum of what scientists do. Without ethics, science is no better than Christianity during the Crusades, a dogma that kills out of arrogance and prejudice.”
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“One parent claimed the intention had been to make life easier for the photographer - so he did not have to keep rearranging his reflector screens.”
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“She was showing Jay Leno and the audience distorted pictures of herself and held up the first photo saying, “Here’s where I look like my Jewish cousin!” It was a picture of her with a huge, distorted nose. No one laughed”
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I’m scratching my head at this part: “He also referred to his Scots and Irish forebears, saying their lives were guided by faith in reason and social justice, “especially the need for those on top to help care for the less fortunate.””
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“the two most unfortunate looking ladies around are Sarah Jessica Parker and Amy Winehouse. Aside from shockingly-low BMIs, what do these women have in common? That’s right, pronounced noses and Jewish heritage!”
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“Worse still, Frere-Jones ascribes racial attributes to the two sides of this outmoded dichotomy: Mind is white, body black. Thus, to Frere-Jones, the Arcade Fire…is pedantic, sexless and indicative of whiteness”
Carmen Van Kerckhove is co-founder and president of 
Jen* wrote:
Note one of the comments on the story about the School that forced kids to pose according to color:
“Okay, so it was stupid, but if anyone was offended by it then they must offend very easily, wht kind of sheltered upbringing have they had? It must be about compensation.” - Dave, Farnborough
These are the kinds of comments that come up over and over again on the message boards at my hometown paper [the augusta chronicle]. People continuously talk about how race doesn’t need to be brought up anymore - cuz it’s no longer an issue - and then they say stuff like this. Daily.
Posted 26 Oct 2007 at 9:45 am ¶
dnA wrote:
I’m really going to need white men to get over the Latina fetish. And while they’re at it, they can get over the “black women aren’t hot” thing, or stop sweating Angelina Jolie’s full but dry lips. KING isn’t making a profit selling just to black men. There’s a reason why white girls don’t want flat booties anymore, and I’ve seen enough blonde white chicks walking around looking like Hulk Hogan to know that tanning salons these days are making windfall profits.
And I’ve read that list. There isn’t a man working at Maxim who wouldn’t be on his knees begging for play if one of them walking in the room.
aaaand I’ve filled my asshole quota for the day.
Posted 26 Oct 2007 at 9:50 am ¶
Peter wrote:
Re: the piece on science…
This piece uses as it’s evidence two bits of “science” that aren’t really terribly scientific- the story about the AA-gun concludes that it’s not an issue of poor design or a machine intended to fire without human authorization, but rather a mechanical failure, one the engineers couldn’t necessarily have foreseen (http://www.engadget.com/2007/10/19/software-glitch-unlikely-to-blame-for-deadly-cannon-incident/)
And second, Watson’s comments illuminate why science is so necessary in the first place: he was a scientist making a decidedly (and self-admittedly) non-scientific claim, one with no observable evidence to back it up. This isn’t to say that arrogance among scientists isn’t a problem, but I should point out that there’s a big difference between saying “science is arrogant” and “scientists are arrogant.”
Science isn’t the sum of what scientists do; science is a logical way of analyzing the world, and critiquing science by using examples where logic was not at play is simply misleading.
Posted 26 Oct 2007 at 11:37 am ¶
C Love wrote:
I wondered about the last line in that Watson article when I read it too. He is a racist and he is not denying it. Less fortunate…..ha! I know what he meant…we all do
Posted 26 Oct 2007 at 4:23 pm ¶
imdeep wrote:
Peter: The link you’re using itself only adds to the speculation. It clearly states the expert’s guessing out of his backside, since he lacks information from an investigation that has yet to be conducted/concluded.
I think the not-altogether-unintentional irony wasn’t lost: this product of engineering, based on science, had to go to batshit in South Africa of all places. Dirt to dollars the thinking behind this “best of breed weaponry” wasn’t concocted by “black DNA”
Posted 26 Oct 2007 at 4:54 pm ¶
Peter wrote:
Imdeep, I’ll play devil’s advocate just to voice a thought and foster responses:
It’s true that engineering on the part of that weapon and the whole theory behind it displays a piece of arrogance on the part of the scientists and engineers that designed it, specifically that a machine can be programmed well enough to be trusted with the task of taking human lives.
However, recent news (Blackwater security, for example, which even if we only count the most recent example killed even more innocent people) is full of reasons to suspect that giving this task to an impartial (read: only able to follow exact programming, errors and bias within that programming notwithstanding) machine may be safer, even if we count tragedies such as this. After all, the gun killed randomly as part of a critical mechanical failure, and not as a result of a racial profile, an act of revenge, or out of anger or spite. Creepy and inhuman as an army of fully mechanized weapons would be, by removing the effects of fear and anger, couldn’t it be said that it would decrease collateral damage to civilians, even if we included accidents like this?
Assuming, of course, we’re not also considering crazy options like “diplomacy.”
Posted 27 Oct 2007 at 6:43 pm ¶