Wednesday, April 19, 2006

The Evolution of Clots

The Evolution of Clots
(Telegraph)
The ID crew, to use Darwin’s own phrase, “look at an organic being as a savage looks at a ship, as at something wholly beyond [their] comprehension.” The first Hawaiians to cast eyes on Europeans were so astonished by their great vessels that they thought their builders to be gods. The ID argument is just the same. It is the logic of ignorance, idleness and incuriosity: I am very smart, even I do not understand this, so why bother to explain it except by bringing in God (if necessary under an alias)?

Scientists, unlike creationists, do not know everything, but as they learn more, every such claim has been rubbished. Evolution is not mocked but glorified by life’s intricacy. ID is a bad idea, but has generated lots of good research, all of which shows how inane it is.

Sunday, April 09, 2006

Girls Gone Wild Released Back Into Civilization

Girls Gone Wild Released Back Into Civilization
(The Onion)


The 11 girls were captured nearly one month ago during their annual spring migration to the area and then put through an intensive rehabilitation program. “They have come a very long way,” Ottley said. “When we first brought them into our clinic, they could barely function beyond baring their breasts, and they communicated solely through loud, sustained hoots.”

Eatery Owner Faces Flogging for Hiring Women

Eatery Owner Faces Flogging for Hiring Women
(Arab News)
When Al-Ramadan arrived in the court, the judge informed him that he had been sentenced in absentia to 90 lashes to be administered in clusters of 30 apiece. The charge against him was violating dignity and decorum.

After further inquiries, Al-Ramadan found out that his crime was employing two young women at his restaurant “Ranoosh” to take orders by phone. That was a year and a half ago when locals reported this supposed infraction to authorities.

Clusters of 30. How considerate.

Friday, April 07, 2006

Beauty and the Fattened Wallet

Beauty and the Fattened Wallet
(The New York Times)
Armed with the data from these experiments and surveys, the economists found several interesting results. It turned out that beautiful people were no better than ordinary people in solving mazes. But despite having the same productivity as others in this task, beautiful people were a lot more confident about their own abilities. Being good looking seems to be strongly associated with self-confidence, a trait that is apparently attractive to employers.

When employers evaluated employees only on the basis of résumés, physical appearance had no impact on their estimates, as one would expect. But all of the other treatments showed higher productivity estimates for beautiful people, with the face-to-face interviews yielding the largest numbers.

It’s a curse, I tell you.