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At some point this week, Gordon Brown will ignore the advice of his own scientists, and reclassify cannabis as a Class B rather than a Class C drug. In doing so, he plans to demonstrate that he is tough on drugs, and in touch with Daily Mail readers. What he’ll actually demonstrate is that he has no interest in creating a meaningful policy that tackles the problems of drugs, based on scientific evidence. Instead, he wants to continue to use a discredited system designed for posturing rather than action, in an attempt to win a few more votes.

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In a move that has seriously concerned the Turkish Human Rights Association, The owner of the Komsu restaurant in Nişantaşı, Istanbul has ordered his service staff to have Botox injections in their armpits, in order to reduce body odour in the sweaty environment. He based his decision on the advice of a dermatologist, whose “medical opinion” as reported seems less than accurate.

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Recently scientists released a study that suggests that due to natural cycles of warming and cooling, global temperatures may remain roughly constant for a few years, even though man-made global-warming will continue on top of that. There’s a good discussion of the media response to this at the always excellent Island of Doubt, but I wanted to focus on one paper in particular - the Daily Mail. Why? Well, partly because along with many other sane people I can’t stand the formerly-Nazi-supporting anti-science sorry excuse for a news outlet, and partly because they have an annoying grip over a lot of middle-class Britain.

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A while ago I posted the story of an 11-year-old child in Wisconsin, U.S.A. who died of diabetic ketoacidosis after her parents decided to cure her with prayer rather than seek medical treatment. Well, the District Attorney has decided to prosecute them for second-degree reckless homicide.

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While I wait for news of my complaint to the Irish authorities over the infamous “Professor” Joseph Obi’s rogue “business” RCAM (coming soon I’m promised), here is another glimpse into former-Doctor Joseph Obi’s bizarre world of fantasy (and surely libel?!), after which we have a reality TV competition to enter! Woo!

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Online polls are not scientific. To state the matter more precisely, a poll on a website which is open to the entire Network and has only minimal measures to guard against repeat voting measures the people who were motivated to respond, not a representative sample of the population. Of course, it’s just like a creationist — beg pardon, a cdesign proponentsist — to rely upon a pseudoscientific tool for spurious validation of his pre-established beliefs. It is also in the nature of things that, on the Network, such attempts will backfire. To wit, consider the poll on the Expelled! movie’s MySpace page. The question was asked, “Do you think the theory of Intelligent Design should be taught in our education system?” The Evil Darwinismistic Conspiracy was alerted to the poll at 10:36 AM Eastern Time, and less than five hours later, this is where the results stand:

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Welly welly welly welly, welly welly well. I don’t normally read the Huffington Post, but thanks to UprightAlice at Pharyngula, I’m hearing that there’s some news worth a listen. This here is James Boyce, who had been upset that Yoko was selling out to the slime of humanity, but then learned more:

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Or
“Do Spurious Links Between Breast Cancer and Abortion Work? Just Did!”

.: I read the opinion page of the Waco Tribune-Herald religiously. I’ve written several letters to editor, usually responding to some clueless creationist’s bogus claims, so I’m always on the lookout for my name (should it appear). Today’s letters to the editor contained a response to the following editorial, which I reproduce in its entirety before it disappears from the internet:

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And so it came to pass that the creationists, realizing that they would be caught ripping off copyrighted material for their propaganda movie, pushed back the release date and did a quick hack job to cover up the stolen footage. Unfortunately, having no actual knowledge of science — if they did, they wouldn’t be creationists — their replacement was rather lacking in the originality department, and the subterfuge did not last. Just how derivative was the hack job the propagandists threw together? Well, if XVIVO’s original “Inner Life of a Cell,” beautiful although somewhat inaccurate, were the riff from “Under Pressure,” then the clip seen in the Expelled movie would play the role of “Ice Ice Baby.” Quidam makes the point more succinctly than I could try:

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An interesting development has unfolded in the math-blogging world. Sal Cordova, famous for calling Charles Darwin a puppy-killer, has attempted to show that he, Cordova, is not a stupefied ignoramus on the subject of quantum mechanics. Naturally, such ignorance would not be a crime, except that Cordova is hell-bent on using quantum physics to prop up his “Advanced Creation Science.” See here, here, here, here and here if you’ve been suffering a lack of reading material. If, on the other hand, you’re a busy citizen of the high-speed modern world, let us summarize:

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