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What I'm reading now:
The God Virus: How religion infects our lives and culture
God Hates You, Hate Him Back: Making Sense of The Bible by CJ Werleman
Microcosm: E. Coli and the New Science of Life (this is excellent. Well written and fascinating. Highly recommended)
God Is Not Great (Hitchens is extremely erudite but I agree with him a lot here. Excellent so far)
The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark (Listening to the audio version. Excellent!)


What I just finished:
Nonsense: Red Herrings, Straw Men and Sacred Cows: How We Abuse Logic in Our Everyday Language
Atheist Universe: The Thinking Person's Answer to Christian Fundamentalism (Recommended. The first half is a great read. Thorough and detailed but easy to understand.)
Letting Go of God (I listened to the audio version. It was poignant and funny. Highly recommended!)
His Dark Materials Trilogy (The Golden Compass; The Subtle Knife; The Amber Spyglass) (best trilogy I've ever read!)

Series

Happy Atheist Love

Random Thoughts On The Nature Of Things

funny-pictures-interesting-catHello everyone,

First, I am now a Google Waver! Find me at zeneece@googlewave.com. I started my first public wave for atheists: Atheists Unite!

Secondly, I must confess my ignorance on a certain matter that has been bouncing around my brain for some time. I have asked my genius husband Butch and he didn’t have an answer, which made me feel better.

I’ll start with an example:

I always thought aspirin was found in the bark of white willows, and then was made in the lab. But the history seems to be entirely in the laboratory, according to Wikipedia. Also there does seem to be a connection between white willow bark and eventually aspirin.

Needless to say these days, aspirin is made strictly in the lab/factory. My question is, if things are made strictly from chemicals, where do the chemicals themselves [...]

Life Is Good. Cinnamon Life Is Better!

Great Spangled Frittillary by ZeNeeceCYou probably have to be American to get the joke in the title. Do other countries have Life cereal? I have no idea. That’s a phrase of my husband Butch’s anyway. I personally think the original Life cereal is the best, not the fancy versions that they also make, like cinnamon, chocolate oat crunch, etc.

Anyhoo, this is a roundup post in which I cover several topics that are tenuously connected at best. Here’s what I’m rambling on about:

  • I’m a citizen scientist now! WOOT!
    • Encyclopedia of Life!
    • My Flickr :)
  • Moving the body affects how we think – a study
  • Prayer and meditation may reshape the brain – a study

First, I want to talk about a ScienceDaily report: Massive Online ‘Macroscopic Observatory’ Of Earth’s Biodiversity To Be Created. “Wanted (soon): observations from environment-minded citizens [...]

What Jesus Wouldn’t Do and What I Have Done

Sometimes you just have to give props where they’re due. Johnny left a comment somewhere around here yesterday with a link to a youtube video. It was so brilliant I have to share it with you immediately. It’s about everyone’s favorite lord, Jesus. Apparently he had a meeting with a group of angels before he had himself impregnated into poor, innocent Mary. This is the video from that meeting. It’s 8:40 minutes long, but entirely awesome. Thanks, Johnny, for letting us know about it!

What I don’t get is that nowhere in the bible is Australia mentioned, and Jesus and the angels are obviously from Down Under. Checkmate, heathens! HA!

empty gesturesAnyway, along the same lines, I have been pretty active on Facebook for a couple weeks or so. Every day people ask me to join causes and groups for one well-meaning reason or another. But no group really [...]

Random Thoughts About Human Impact On Evolution

Charles Darwin

Charles Darwin celebrated his 200th birthday February 12 of this year. So of course many of the science podcasts I listen to, as well as many of the science and skeptic sites I visit, have been talking about evolution and Darwin and all that good stuff. Evolution is often paraphrased as the term, survival of the fittest, which is inaccurate. Here is how Dictionary.com defines it, as well as some other terms, just so we’re all on the same page:

  • Survival of the Fittest
    a 19th-century concept of human society, inspired by the principle of natural selection, postulating that those who are eliminated in the struggle for existence are the unfit.
  • Natural Selection
    n. The process in nature by which, according to Darwin’s theory of evolution, only the organisms best adapted to their environment tend to survive and transmit their genetic characteristics in increasing numbers to succeeding [...]

Dead Cats Into Diesel

Ok, for some reason this struck me as a bit…. odd. Diesel from dead cats? I just had to share it with you, since we’re Heaving Dead Cats around here on a regular basis. Now we can save money, heave dead cats and make fuel! Woot!

Dr Christian Koch, 55, from Kleinhartmannsdorf, has a special method for turning household garbage into biodiesel. This leads me to believe you can make biodiesel out of just about anything.

So, his method involves heating stuff like old tires, paper, motor oil, plastic, dead cats, just about anything, to 300 degrees Celsius. Then the hydrocarbons go through a catalytic converter.

Now I’ll know what to do with all those dead cats in my freezer! (JUST KIDDING)

Found Here and

A Solar Revolution In Our Future

In a giant leap for clean energy, MIT professor Daniel Nocera and his team, have developed a simple method to split water molecules and produce oxygen gas. This paves the way for large scale use of solar power.

Getting energy from the sun isn’t the hard part, it seems. It’s storing that energy that has been a problem.

These guys at MIT were inspired by how plants perform photosynthesis. Their revolutionary method uses abundant, non-toxic natural materials.

I won’t get into all the details, but I just wanted to share it with you because it seems pretty important and wonderful.

Here’s a link to MIT where they have a video of Daniel Nocera describing the new process and a lot more details.

This is just the beginning though. It’s still not really cost effective, but other scientists will be able to run with it and [...]

Farm Fountains and Aquariums

How about a self contained living river ecosystem in your living room? I love the idea of combining art into something practical, useful and also great for the environment, so this really fits the bill. [...]

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