Chaos

The summer has been hectic, preparing for college and such. I plan to resume the blog in a few weeks once the chaos dies down.

So Little Time

Well with high school graduation right around the corner I haven't had time to blog. So Hopefully after graduation I will be able to activate the blog again (because I have a lot to say)....

Lastly Check Out EXPELLED EXPOSED, it is a site dedicated to exposing all the illogical nonsense and creationism promoted in Ben Steins documentary... no wait, movie.... Errr I guess you could call it a horror film... Hmmmm no wait horror films usually don't have a worldwide agenda to propel our public education system further down the hole... Anyway, check out the site, it has some pretty good information, and the truth about Ben Steins Bullshit.... hmmm that's a good pun Ben Stein = BS = BullShit

Oooppps, I guess I should have looked at all the canidates

In a previous post I gave my endorsement to Barrack Obama, because at the time he seemed like the best candidate. Let me say I was ignorant and did this under false pretense. Thanks to the enlightenment of the New York Skeptics I can now revoke my endorsement for that other guy and vote for a candidate who knows whats going on. Now I want to say that we will face massive opposition in the fall (Har Har, yes I know). Our opponents will throw every illogically crafted argument at us, they will use scare tactics and they will even deny the validity of accepted theories!

So to prevent a loss in the fall we must make our mission clear and appoint the appropriate cabinet. Here's how it breaks down

President: Mr. Charles Darwin (Yes he's dead but presidents do relatively little and he will still be more effective than the outgoing incumbent)

Vice President: Richard Dawkins (Another man of Great Britain, but hey obviously he is more qualified that the other Dick)

White House Chief of Staff: Neil DeGrasse Tyson (He just looks like a guy who can get things done)

Secretary of State: George Carlin (Remember it's all B.S. and it's bad for you)

Secretary of Defense: PZ Myers (of course I refer to the defence of science from the GODIDIT's)

The Attorney General: Carl Sagan (Enough Said)

Secretary of Education: Phil Plait (I think this one is obvious, we need a great advocate of astronomy)

Director of National Intelligence: Stephen Pinker (Our favorite Canadian philosopher. This position will now regulate the intelligence of our own citizens)

Secretary of Agriculture: Eugenie Scott (Anthropologist around the world would rejoice)

Secretary of Energy: Kip Thorne (After all who knows more about energy than Kip!)

Secretary of Human Services: Daniel Dannett (Can I hear Ethics reform?)

Speaker Of The House: Sam Harris (Advocating Atheism!)

President Pro Tempore (senate): Christpoher Hitchens (Need I say More?)

Well that will work out well, and man what a group this would be! In November we usher in an age brighter than anything we can imagine!!!

NASA to Zatheist: Please take control of Cassini!

On June 10th 2008 when the Cassini spacecraft orbiting Saturn is only 793,000 kilometers (about 493,700 miles) away from Saturn's cloud tops, traveling toward Saturn at a speed of about six kilometers per second NASA will turn over control of the on board camera to me!


Or At least that's how I hope it will go...



You see NASA is hosting a contest called "Scientist for a Day" in which 1st-12th grade students have the opportunity to submit a telescope proposal to use the Cassini telescope for 55 minutes!!! Extremely COOL!!! Although NASA only allows you to select so many targets and only allows you to use the narrow angle camera the contest gives students a unique opportunity to use one of the most advanced space telescopes ever built. This is also great for NASA's public relations because it gets the community involved. I think that NASA needs to do more projects like this with all of the missions. I realize that telescope time is invaluable to astronomers but once the telescope finishes its primary mission the the telescopes are underused and in the worst case are decommissioned. However, involving the public in space missions excites people, and they become more inclined to support space exploration and space sciences. This program is a step in the right direction for NASA's PR rehab intervention. If we hope to make it back to the moon, and then to Mars we must get the public excited

This is NASA's 5th annual scientist for a day contest and I plan to win this time. I entered the last scientist for a day contest but I was only a "finalist." My proposal suggested using the narrow angle camera (back then they let you choose the camera you wanted to use) to photograph Prometheus and the F ring, at close range. I argued that if we take a series of similar photographs we will learn a lot about ring dynamics, and ring formation. Planetary rings are interesting and not very well understood, so this time I plan to choose a similar target.

This time I plan to purpose we use the narrow angle camera to photograph a flyby of the moon Pan in the Encke gap. The image to the left is a simulated image of the target I propose we photograph.


Here is the essay I wrote for the last contest, (less than 500 words or less explaining why you want to photograph the target) criticism, suggestion, commentary, and any knowledge you posses about the subject is welcome and encouraged.

As one of the thinnest and outermost rings of Saturn, the F ring may seem of little significance, but continued observation of Saturn’s F ring and its shepherd moon Prometheus will give us invaluable insight into the gravitational interactions that take place between this tenuous ring and small moon. Previous observations made by the Cassini spacecraft suggest that perturbations caused by the gravitational force exerted on the F ring by the small moon Prometheus create its unique knotted and braided structure. Although we can confidently theorize that these structures are created by Prometheus, questions still exist about the dynamic interactions that exist between these two bodies: such as the origin of this small ring… was it created by a primordial disk along with the major rings or is it a result of lost material from Prometheus’s loose icy body? Another property of the ring that remains mysterious is the presence of sub-rings periodically observed with the F ring. Why are these rings seen so infrequently? Could their existence be associated with an unobserved geological activity occurring on a large nearby moon? Alternatively, could they arise from a favorable orientation between the two bodies, which as the distance varies, the rings begin to fragment due to the loss of the gravitational shepherding provided by Prometheus? Or could this happen when Prometheus is at apoapsis and actually creates gaps between the F ring because of its close proximity? Lastly, if Prometheus is indeed the main source of the particles in the F rings does Prometheus lose mass or density due to the interactions or, is the moon constantly replenished due to the close proximity to the ring?

Many of these questions may be answered and studied further if Cassini’s cameras are pointed to target three.
Target three will not only provide us with visually appealing photos, it will also increase our understanding of an obscure component of the Saturnian system. Using the narrow angle camera aboard Cassini we will be able to attain high-resolution images of Prometheus and the F ring that may provide us with valuable information on interactions between shepherd moons and their rings. This target will also provide information about the formation of Saturn’s immense ring system as a whole, the role of multiple moons in the evolution of a planet, and the evolution of the moons themselves.

I was skeptical but he finally convinced me

Up until now I wasn't sold on any of our presidential candidates. There is that old elephant in the room McCain, Monica Lewinskys "friend's" wife, and that green horn Barrack Obama. Although Bill Clinton had some marriage issues while in office I think that he was a decent president, ((well better than Bush at least) (remember I've only been alive during the Clinton and Bush administrations.)) While in office Hillary did some pretty impressive stuff, and we know Bill Clinton is a pretty decent guy, so logically my vote in the primary went to Hillary. But in light of a comment recently made by Barrack I think I've jumped ship. During an interview with the York Daily Record the following occurred


Q: York County was recently in the news for a lawsuit involving the teaching of intelligent
design. What’s your attitude regarding the teaching of evolution in public schools?


A: “I’m a Christian, and I believe in parents being able to provide children with religious instruction without interference from the state.
But I also believe our schools are there to teach worldly knowledge and science. I believe in evolution, and I believe there’s a difference between science and faith. That doesn’t make faith any less important than science. It just means they’re two different things. And I think it’s a mistake to try to cloud the teaching of science with theories that frankly don’t hold up to scientific inquiry.“

Now I'm not a "Barrackaholic" but with the creationist pushing intelligent bullshi* now more than ever, Barrack is the only candidate with a logical, clear, concise stance on the issue.

Zeitgeist - Doomed!

I'm not one who is big on conspiracy theories because they promote illogical thinking, misplace skepticism, and can cause physical harm so I usually don't go around and watch their propaganda movies, but Zeitgeist seems to be all the buzz around the Internet, so I felt compelled to watch it. These movies are almost always absurd so I watched it with low expectations. After all as a skeptic I've herd most of the ridiculous conspiracy theories that float around so I thought I had seen it all. Boy was I WRONG!

Zeitgeist is a "truth" documentary combining many of the biggest conspiracy theories that prosper today into one massive conspiracy theory. Simply put their theory states that Christianity/Catholicisms, The U.S. government, and the IRS and banking institutions all around the world are out to control us by creating perpetual war as a means to remove our civil liberties, then removing all national boundaries to create a "one world government," then implanting us with nano-chips to control every aspect of our lives, THEN brainwashing everyone. Basically the mecca of all conspiracy theories. Despite the fact that they combine tons of conspiracy theories that have little to do with each other beyond that they are conspiracy theories, they make many flawed arguments about Astronomy, theology, the IRS, banks, and 9/11.

But before I take a logical stab at the movie, I will say that the movie itself is mildly entertaining, if you sit drooling without any conscious thought. The entire movie full of non sequiturs, red herrings, and quotes (that have been pulled out of context) explained by the narrator. But it's not all bad, surprisingly there are some parts of the movie that woke me up. During the intro they do have a excerpt from the George Carlin's skit "You Are All Diseased" which is always amusing, and they even have some Bill Hicks comedy skits thrown in there.They also have a very cool animation sequence during the intro that depicts the earth and the evolution of species, but I doubt this is their own work. The highlight of the movie is the ending (yes I know) when they have an excerpt from Carl Sagan's Cosmos. Lastly the some of the music is very good, especially the piece used during the outro which sounds like it is played by a harp and marimba. If anyone knows who the composer is I encourage you to e-mail me.

OK now that my movie critique is done, we can begin to debunk some of the fallacious arguments that the movie makes. Since the 9/11 myths have been debunked numerous times (here, here, and here) and we do have to pay taxes no matter what the conspiracy theorist state, I will focus on the first part of the movie. Now I do not doubt that many of religious stories are similar and come from similar origins. However, I do doubt almost every single astronomical argument that the move makes. The first mistake made in the movie concerns the Zodiac. Apparently the director of the movie has no knowledge of astronomy, because he makes the faulty assumption that the zodiac has 12 constellations, yes this is true if we are talking about the historical astrological zodiac. However the movie makes no effort to differentiate between the astronomical zodiac, and the historical astrological zodiac, and maintains the later definition throughout the movie. Even though they constantly move from a historical standpoint to a scientific standpoint. The movie also claims "the Sun resides in the vicinity of the Southern Cross, or Crux, constellation." Fist of all Crux is a southern hemisphere constellation, even 2,000 years ago it was barley visible from Mediterranean and was not considered its own constellation, instead it was thought to be part of Centaurus.

Ahhhh. Shall we continue... I think we should because the myth busting is only beginning!

The movie also claims "The star in the east is Sirius, the brightest star in the night sky, which, on December 24th, aligns with the 3 brightest stars in Orion's Belt." Fist of all, the belt stars in Orion are always aligned with Sirius, in fact I was taught orient myself using Orion's belt and Sirius. They continue this fallacious argument even further when they state that "Sirius, blazing in the southern sky--not however due south from you, but somewhat to the left of the Meridian line. Some three thousand years ago (owing to the Precession of the Equinoxes) that star at the winter solstice did not stand at midnight where you now see it, but almost exactly on the meridian line." This is the big one and the one that bugged me the most. The claim sounded like it could be true but I still doubted the validity. So using simple math I tested the claim. A cycle of the precession of the Equinoxes takes about 26,000 years, in a westward motion. The movie clims that Sirius was due east. For the sake of simplicity we will say that Sirius is now due south. Now first I divided 26,000 years by 4. I did this because it shows how long it takes a star to move from one due direction to another. My result was 6,500 indicating that Sirius was not in the east during biblical times only 2,000 years ago. Instead Sirius was still in the South like it is now, just a little offset.

See folks simple logic.

Welcome to the Family

Today I was added to the Atheist blogroll.

Well what can I say? This is the first real milestone in the chronicles of Zatheist, and hopefully it will bring me more readers...

For those of you who don't know the Atheist Blogroll is the definitive list of Internet blogsn written by atheists, agnostics, skeptics, and freethinkers. The blogroll currently has over 600 members including some of the greatest atheist bloggers on the net such as the Angry Astronomer and PZ Myer's (Pharyngula.) The blogroll is the brainchild of Atheist blogger Mojoey who runs the great blog Deep Thoughts one of my primary sources of atheist news.