Smartphones now supported

I just added some features that will make this site much more user-friendly when you view it on a smartphone: an iPhone, an Android, a Blackberry, whatever. Unfortunately, I don’t own any of those, so I don’t really know how well it works.

If anybody out there owns a smartphone, I’d really appreciate it if you could call up this site and make sure everything looks ok. Naturally, some features of the full site are missing, deliberately. You can still load the normal site (scroll to the bottom) if you want, but it’s not very usable on such a small screen.

If you could add a quick comment, that’d be great. Just say “looks fine” or “it’s working” or whatever you like.

Our #1 priority: change the way our leaders are elected

If you’re anything like me, you’re racked with anxiety, fear, frustration and rage over the state of modern US politics. News story after soul-crushing news story, I feel like I’m being mentally beaten with hammers, and I want to just shut it all out and pretend that everything is ok. I used to look down on the people who were oblivious to the goings-on of the world; now I envy them.

We seem to be stuck in a never-ending cycle between a party of high-order incompetents (the Democrats) and a party of angry, hateful zealots (the Republicans). Both are only interested in power. Both are firmly entrenched. Both are crooked to the bone. Neither represents what America needs or even wants.

I ask myself, how can we fix our political system? I come up with some answers I think are pretty good: term limits; public funding of elections; more oversight and transparency. Simple solutions like these could go a long way toward fixing what’s wrong with America. There’s just one problem: none of it will ever happen. Not in any meaningful way.

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Dubiosity Digest for August 5th, 2010

The Dubiosity Digest is a collection of interesting articles that I find around the internet. Rather than post each individually (and drown out my other posts) I have mine collected into this digest on a monthly basis.

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Essential atheist/skeptic/freethinker/whatever books

Bookshelf

This is something I’ve been meaning to put together for a while, but I was inspired to finally do it by the American Freethought podcast. They put out a list of essential books, with the results taken from numerous important atheists/skeptics/freethinkers/whatevers. Their list is good, but there’s a lot of stuff on there that I have no interest in, or I think is overrated. (On the Origin of Species is an important book historically, but there are far better books on evolution for you to read, with up-to-date science.)

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Why psychic abilities probably aren’t possible

If only psychic abilities were as obvious as this.

Usually when someone is arguing that psychics aren’t real, they talk about cold reading, self-delusion, and the willingness to believe. In other words, they explain how a psychic is doing what they’re doing.

I’m going to try a different take. I’m going to try to show that what psychics claim to be doing is impossible, by using evolution as our guide.

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So close, yet so far

The USS Douglas Adams, the finest ship in the fleet (pffft)

I’ve been itching to try Star Trek Online for a while now. When it was still in development, I tried to get into the beta, but had no luck. Then I tried to find a demo or trial to play, but at first they didn’t offer one. And that’s a big mistake that most other online games make; if I can’t try a game, I’m not going to buy it. I’m not going to spend my money on a game I’ve never played, unless it comes from Blizzard.

Fortunately, there’s now a demo for STO, so I eagerly loaded it up (through Steam) and tried it out.

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Some old crap, for your amusement

I just imported some of my blog posts from my old blog, “Bevans Rants”. It was mostly just a bunch of opinions I thought were clever at the time, graphic design projects I thought were good at the time, and observations I thought were insightful at the time. In other words, not much different from Dubiosity.

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Abortion: where do you draw the line?

This is a metaphor. Get it?

I’ll start this out by saying that I’m in favor of abortion rights. I’m pro-choice. I’ll spare you my reasoning, because you’ve probably heard it all before, and who the hell wants to hear it again?

But one question I’ve always wondered is: where do you draw the line? When is it too late to perform an abortion? When does an embryo become a human?

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This is nature’s way of reminding us who’s the boss

eyjafjallajokull-stars_over_eruption

If you haven’t heard already, there’s currently a volcano acting up in Iceland. It’s called Eyafallajökull, which is almost entirely unpronounceable by American tongues.

Apparently, (according to that unending font of human knowledge, Wikipedia) Eyafallajökull has erupted 3 times in all of recorded history. And each time, its eruption has been a mere precursor to the eruption of another nearby volcano, the much more active Katla. Eyafallajökull has already caused a lot of disruption, especially in European air travel, and I can just imagine what kind of chaos Katla might cause.

Eyafallajökull has also provided us with an incredible show over the past few days. It’s not just ash and lava, as if that weren’t cool enough already. As you can see at the link below, it’s also causing an incredible lightning display. This is the raw power of nature, on display for all to see.

These images come from another site, which is currently down due to excess traffic. I don’t know if the person who runs this site is associated with the other site, or if they just took the images and reposted them. Once I find out for sure, I’ll update this link accordingly.

Avatar and the future of 3D (Part 2)

Don't stare at it too long.

For a few years now, 3D has been making a slow comeback. In the past, it’s been little more than a gimmick, and was hindered by issues such as poor image quality and clunky glasses for the audience to wear. But with Avatar, 3D proved itself to Hollywood as a great way to make money. But has 3D finally moved into the mainstream, or is it still too soon?

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