New science carnival, second edition

For lovers of the physical sciences — and isn’t that everyone? — the latest edition of the latest science blog carnival, Philosophia Naturalis, is at Nonoscience. Check it out.

Nevada teen says she agreed to edited speech, but regretted it later

Brittany McComb, the Henderson, Nevada, valedictorian whose graduation address was censored by school officials, told the Los Angeles Times that she agreed to school officials’ editing of her speech only because she felt intimidated by them.

She and her parents attempted to forestall the editing out of McComb’s religious references, but could not contact lawyers to seek a solution, she said. Her parents were out of town, so she gave in when a school official insisted that she not deviate from the edited speech.

Instead, McComb gave her original address, resulting in school officials pulling the plug on her microphone in the middle of the valedictory. She has since filed a discrimination suit in federal districty court, alleging her rights of free speech and equal protection under the law were infringed, and asking for $1 in damages.

The conservative legal organization, the Rutherford Institute, is representing McComb in her suit.

In her interview with LA Times reporter Richard Abowitz, McComb comes off as an idealistic young woman who wanted to resist what she saw as censorship of her valedictory, but who lacked the resolve to stand up to school officials on her own.

Yes. The actual situation was that the my assistant principal confronted me in the hallway and demanded to know what I was going to do. My parents were out of town. We still had not contacted the lawyer. Everything was chaotic, and I was like “What am I going to do?” I had no idea. So I had to say something and I was at my wits end. I was very intimidated. So I kind-of said, “yes” and I regret it. I wish I had stood up right then for myself.

She told Abowitz that she and her parents’ attempts to contact the school district’s attorney were repeatedly rebuffed. In the end, she chose to give her address as she had planned, since she felt God’s and Jesus’ roles in her life were very important to her.

School officials, who were advised by an ACLU lawyer that the speech was too religious in tone, edited out most of McComb’s references to God and Jesus’ suffering.

Abowitz solicited questions from readers of his blog, and asked some of their questions along with his own during the 15-minute phone interview with McComb and her Rutherford Institute attorney. His blog has the transcript.

Tangled Bank, numero cincuenta nueve

My gloss on “gravity deniers” is in the latest Tangled Bank, number 59, now available for your enjoyment at Science and Reason. There’s a lot to read there, so prolific are we science bloggists. Maybe we need to develop a Tangled-Bank-on Tape product.

Tangled Bank #58 is here!

From the sunny city of Stockholm, Tangled Bank #58 has come to enlighten readers with incisive and witty science coverage. Pay it a visit. Tack så mycket!

The latest “scientific breakthrough” scam — water gas

The gullibility of the scientifically challenged media and buying public never ceases to amaze. Spurred perhaps by sharply higher gasoline prices, backyard inventors and shady promoters are pushing the latest wonder technology, “HHO gas,” otherwise known as water gas, Brown’s gas or Klein’s gas.

For a tidy investment of a few hundred dollars, one can adapt a car to run on HHO, or for a few thousand, one can buy a device to produce HHO at home for transportation or for welding. Cars apparently can run for miles on mere puffs of HHO, and torches can burn holes in seconds through most metals.

I would encourage anyone buying such devices to first watch videos of the Graf Hindenburg accident in 1937 or the Shuttle Challenger accident in 1986, to get an idea of the Promethean power of HHO gas.

Wait, 1937? Isn’t HHO supposed to be a new technology? you ask. Nope. In fact, the principles behind the production of HHO have been known and used for close to 200 years. If you were lucky, you might have even made some in middle school science class.

If you run electric current through water, you break water down into its constituent parts, hydrogen and oxygen, both gases at standard temperature (20 C) and pressure (1 atmosphere). Very little current is required; a 6-volt lantern battery does the trick nicely, although quite slowly.

The science class experiment generally involves upending two test tubes over the positive and negative electrodes submerged in the water. Hydrogen collects over one electrode, and oxygen over the other one. (Hydrogen ions are positively charged; oxygen ions negatively.) Since there are twice as many H atoms in water as O atoms, the volume of the hydrogen (H₂) gas is twice that of the oxygen (O₂) gas.

Frequently the experiment also involves pulling the H₂ test tube out of the water and placing a burning wooden splint near its mouth to ignite the H₂, producing a characteristic whooping sound and some water vapor that condenses on the glass tube.

Placing a glowing wooden splint into the O₂ tube will result in the splint bursting into flame, as the oxygen-rich environment accelerates the combustion process.

As well as being less dense than air, hydrogen is a highly flammable gas. H₂ mixed in air is a “weaker” form of HHO gas, since air is a mixture of oxygen, nitrogen and carbon dioxide. A spark or a flame will immediately ignite any H₂ around by providing just enough energy for the H₂ and O₂ present to recombine into water.

Test tube amounts of H₂ produce whooping noises. An airship the size of the Hindenburg (at right) can produce a much more dramatic effect, as it did on the fateful day in 1937 when the airship burst into flame as it came in for a landing.

Mixing pure H₂ and pure O₂ increases both the temperature and the speed of the reaction, which is the key to HHO’s success as a welding gas, automobile fuel, and rocket propellant.

The space shuttles use “HHO” in their main engines. At launch, each shuttle is attached to a huge external fuel tank containing cryogenic vessels filled with liquid H₂ and liquid O₂. Igniting the H₂/O₂ mix produces a lot of thrust for the money, and the byproduct is just water.

The downside is the explosive danger of a pure H₂/O₂ mix, as the Challenger accident so tragically demonstrated. Flames from a leaky solid-rocket booster on that day burned a hole through the external fuel tank, which then exploded just minutes after launch (at left), killing the seven astronauts on board.

So, I would I think twice about running around town with a tank of HHO in the trunk of my car, or producing HHO in my basement for storage. Gasoline is safe and stable in comparison.

HHO gas is not the cure-all that its promoters say it is. Sure, it is a clean-burning fuel. It can be an effective welding gas. And cars can in fact burn HHO either mixed with gasoline vapor or by itself. But HHO gas will not end our dependence on foreign oil or substantially reduce pollution, no matter what anyone says.

You need electricity to produce HHO. To produce large quantities of HHO is a reasonable time, say a few hours, you need a lot of current, which does not come cheap. Your power company supplies current to your home and office by burning, for most communities, fossil fuels like coal or oil. If you’re drawing a lot current to fill your bomb-like container of HHO gas, the power company has to burn more oil or coal to supply the electricity. You can’t get something from nothing.

Now, if the power company used hydroelectric generators or a nuclear power plant to provide the current, you might be able to justify pulling all those amperes to electrolyze your water into HHO. You are still gong to have to pay the light bill, though, so the economics of producing HHO at home might not be any better than just filling up at the local gas station for $3 a gallon.

In short, dear reader, caveat emptor. HHO gas is a scam. It is not a miracle technology or a cure for our gasoline dependence. At best, it is a deception, a way for clever promoters to make money, and endanger the unwary consumer.

Oh, for Pete’s sake! It’s just a movie.

Superman in his latest incarnation is a box office smash, a suitable homage to the late Christopher Reeve’s version with a 21st century twist. Amazingly, some conservative bloggers find fault with the movie, for purely socio-political reasons. Chief among them is self-promoting expert on everything Debbie Schlussel.

Who is Debbie Schlussel? Well, I didn’t know either until I started blogging. Schlussel is a sharp-tongued critic of everything to the left of her far-right agenda, especially Hollywood stars who she believes suck up to Arab ass too much. Like all conservative pundits, Schlussel takes everything in popular culture seriously, as if each song lyric, film premise or TV show spells the end of civilization as we know it.

Schlussel is a Jewish Ann Coulter, if you will.

Anyway, Schlussel pops up on TV and radio every once in awhile to spout her special kind of invective. On MSNBC and on her own blog, she lambasts some of the plotline of Superman Returns. I will attempt to summarize, but the links to her post and to the MSNBC transcript are below if you want the news directly from the horse’s mouth.

1. Superman is a wimp because he leaves Earth for five years to “find himself” and his home planet, Krypton, “like every sensitive, slacker metrosexual.” (her blog)
2. Lois Lane is a slut because she has slept with two men (Clark and her fiance), and has a child by one of them, she’s not too sure which.
3. Lois Lane is against marriage, and says so, despite being affianced.
4. Lois Lane wants to devote herself to her career, and remain a single mother
5. The film makers dropped the phrase “and the American Way,” from the 1950′s TV show intro of Supie standing up for “truth, justice and the American Way.”
6. HIs muscles are toned down.
7. HIs cape is not bright red, but “a muted burgundy. It‘s kind of a dingy, you know, “Vogue” kind of fashion you‘d see on one of their androgynous models.” (MSNBC commentary)
8. He’s fighting Lex Luthor, instead of someone more relevant, like AL Qaeda terrorists.

So, let me state categorically that all this close analysis is just plain stupid. Superman is a comic book character. So is Lois. They exist in a fantasy universe. To quote Groucho Marx, “any resemblance between these two characters and reality is merely coincidental.”

That said, let me, as a comic book reader from way back, address Schlussel’s points.

1. Imagine you are an orphan, the Last Son of Krypton. Your parents and your entire home world have been obliterated. Astronomers discover remnants of your home. What do you do? Ignore the whole thing, and go back to life as usual? Or do you use your superpowers to visit what’s left of home?
2. Two guys. One of whom has been gone for five years with no explanation. You are sleeping with the man you are going to marry. And you’re a slut? Then millions of other women are, too.
3. Nothing new here. Don’t blame Lois.
4. Uhh, ditto. Old plot device, dating back to the ’70s. Remember “Murphy Brown?”
5. Only the George Reeves TV show had “truth, justice and the American Way” in the intro to Superman. Recent versions of Superman have dropped the American Way part to emphasize that Supie had adopted the whole Earth as his home. (In fact, strictly speaking, he was an illegal alien, bypassing border patrols entirely. IIRC, a president granted him citizenship some years back.)
6. Both George and Christopher Reeves and Dean Cain were fit men, but none were built like Schwarzenegger. Brandon Routh is not that much smaller. Besides, they’re actors. No human living or dead can actually look exactly like a comic book character.
7. And Batman’s comic book costume was apparently just fabric, but his movie costume is more like lightweight armor. So the movie Batman is afraid of being shot dead by bullets? Perhaps the latest Superman is a clothes horse, and gets tired of red and blue with yellow accents. Who the F cares? It’s a comic book.
8. Terrible plot idea. Lex personifies “evil villain,” and is one single enemy. Al Qaeda is an organization with thousands of members. So, Superman is supposed to defeat them all in a two-hour movie, and do what with them? Send them all to the Phantom Zone? Besides, if Superman singlehandedly ends the War on Terror, what platform does the Republican Party have for the 2008 presidential election campaign?

Schlussel spends part of her time bewailing what terrible role models Superman and Lois are for the kiddie audience. Both characters, to her, are too self-absorbed and too imperfect. That Lois is (gasp) sleeping with a man to whom she is not married, and has a child out of wedlock, well, that’s just plain awful. Now all children watching this flick will want to wear burgundy capes for Hallowe’en and leave home to “find themselves” — native Americans call this a “vision quest,” BTW. All girls will want to pine for superpowerful, godlike lovers, ditch their fiances and sleep around with two men.

Puhleeze! I repeat — It. Is. Just. a. Movie. It’s not real, and was never intended to resemble reality. Debbie Schlussel, get a life.

Links:

Schlussel blog MSNBC transcript

Superman: The Man of Steel

Superman: Birthright

Blocked blogger files lawsuit against Gov. Fletcher

Mark Nickolas, whose site BluegrassReports.org state administrators have blocked from state-owned computers, filed a suit today in US District Court, contending that Kentucky Gov. Ernie Fletcher has violated Constitutional guarantees of equal protection and free expression.

State web blocking software allowed state employees access to mainstream news sites and many conservative blogs, but prevented employees from accessing Nickolas’ site and other less conservative blogs.

BluegrassReports.org has been sharply critical of the beleaguered Fletcher, whose administration has been sullied by accusations of preferential and discriminatory hiring practices. State GOP leaders have recently distanced themselves from Fletcher, who intends to run for re-election next year.
Details about the lawsuit and the events leading up to it are here.

Bush’s eloquency — not!

For a Yale graduate, our prexy seems to express important ideas paradoxically like a 14-year-old. Witness this comment from his press conference in Chicago this week:

“And it’s, kind of — you know, it’s kind of painful in a way for some to watch, because it takes a while to get people on the same page,” Bush said. “Not everybody thinks the exact same way we think. Different words mean different things to different people. And the diplomatic processes can be slow and cumbersome.”

Yup. That’s true, but could we have expressed it with somewhat more erudition?

Now that the Shuttle is in orbit …

Despite all the media frenzy about the risks to the crew, Discovery successfully made orbit Tuesday and docked with the International Space Station this morning. So far the mission of STS-121 is so routine as to be boring. And that’s good.

The big issue in media reports centered around the foam insulation surrounding the external fuel tank – the rusty-red cylinder carrying the liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen “fuel” for the shuttle’s main engines. The insulation is necessary to keep the liquified gases cold.

It also has a tendency to fall off during launch. A large chunk of insulation hit the Shuttle Columbia on takeoff, damaging its protective, heat resistant tiles. The Columbia disintegrated on re-entry on Feb. 1,� 2003, as a result of the damage. Atmospheric friction burned holes through the metal skin of the spaceplane, killing all on board.

NASA officials, not known for their eloquence, reported that inspection of Discovery‘s external fuel tank had revealed some fracturing or loosening of the foam insulation, but that the faults would not endanger the mission.

They said nothing about endangering the crew, although it is probably what they meant. The media nearly went ape-shit, claiming NASA officials were more worried about making a return to space after a three-year hiatus than about ensuring the lives of the seven-person crew.

Engineers and military types, in my experience, tend to focus on missions in an overly abstract sense, seemingly distancing themselves from the obvious truth that human lives are involved. Space exploration, after all, is a voluntary occupation. Astronauts choose their profession, knowing the risks involved. Their support crews also understand the risks, and of course value the astronauts’ lives. They just seem to have difficulty expressing that concern during media briefings.

As far as anyone can tell at this point, NASA called it right, as there seems to be no damage to the ship’s tiles. This shuttle landing will be as smooth as all the 113 previous ones, with the sole exception of Columbia and Challenger, which exploded soon after takeoff on Jan. 28, 1986. While one might want better odds, considering the parameters of these flights, the odds are still in the astronauts’Â� favor.
Risk is unavoidable in spaceflight. If we eliminated all risks, we would never have crossed oceans, flown in rickety planes, and sent men to the moon.

Bon voyage, Discovery, et bonne chance!

It’s the end of civility as we know it

Apparently, the latest rightwing tactic in its battle for “truth, justice and the American way” is to intimidate private citizens.

Case 1. A Jewish family in Delaware has filed suit against the Indian River School District, alleging school officials of heavily pushing Christianity and alleging harassment of Jewish children. The Delaware ACLU has taken on the case, prompting a leading anti-ACLU group to post the family’s name, address and telephone number on its website. The family has since moved, fearing for its safety.

The Stop the ACLU Coalition advises its readers of the rules for this new “outing the plaintiffs” program:

1. If it’s a 10 Commandments, cross or religious symbols case, you may call only if you live in the jurisdiction. If the suit is against a county, you may call if you reside in that county. If the suit is against a city, you may call only if you live in that city.
2. If it’s a school that’s involved such as in this one, you may call if you live in the district or have a student attending the school there or if you have a family member working there.
3. If #s 1 and 2 do not apply, please only write a letter. We will also post e-mail addresses if they can be found.
4. In all your communications, written or verbal, do not harass and do not be rude. You can be firm and angry but do not use profanity and under no circumstances should you threaten the party involved. Your outrage is fully understood and shared but harassment and threats serve only to harm us and could even get the police involved which we don’t want. Remember, you represent the Coalition.
5. Get others involved.

Case 2: The New York Times recently published a puff piece about the Maryland homes of Vice President Dick Cheney and Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, among other wealthy citizens. Rightwingnuts jumped on the story as treasonous and excoriated the Times as a tool for terrorists planning to assassinate Cheney and Rumsfeld. One blogger went so far as to suggest:

So, in the school of what’s good for the goose is good for the gander, we are providing this link so YOU may help the blogosphere in locating the homes (perhaps with photos?) of the editors and reporters of the New York Times.

Let’s start with the following New York Times reporters and editors: Arthur “Pinch” Sulzberger Jr. , Bill Keller, Eric Lichtblau, and James Risen. Do you have an idea where they live?

Go hunt them down and do America a favor. Get their photo, street address, where their kids go to school, anything you can dig up, and send it to the link above. This is your chance to be famous – grab for the golden ring.

The rest of the sordid story is here and at The Daily Kos. (Updated here.)

Professional journalists — nay, any right-thinking , civilized person — would never stoop so low as to threaten the privacy and safety of anyone’s family, regardless of the issue. Yet, the so-called monitors and guardians of moral decency and “family values” feel obliged to threaten and bully those who disagree with their extremist views. There must a special circle in Hell for these hypocrites.