Tonight, look for the northern sky’s two most prominent sky patterns – the constellation Cassiopeia the Queen and the Big Dipper. Both circle around Polaris, the North Star, once a day. They are opposite each other, one on either side of the North Star.
Are you an early riser? Then use the waning moon to locate the planet Mars and the planet Spica before sunrise. Read more
At nightfall, the constellation Cassiopeia the Queen is easy to recognize in the northern sky, either in the evening or before dawn. This constellation is shaped like a W or M and contains five moderately bright stars. The distinctive shape of Cassiopeia makes her very noticeable among the stars of the northern sky.
And, of course, Ursa Major the Greater Bear – which contains the Big Dipper asterism – is one of the most famous of all star patterns. At nightfall this month, Cassiopeia shines high in the north while the Dipper lurks low. They are always on opposite sides of the North Star. From the southern half of the U.S., the Big Dipper is actually partially or totally beneath the horizon this month in the evening hours. North of about 40 degrees north latitude (the latitude of Denver, Colorado), the Big Dipper always stays above the horizon (if it’s level).
That’ll change as night passes, as the great carousel of stars wheels westward (counter-clockwise) around Polaris, the North Star. Polaris resides halfway between Cassiopeia and the Big Dipper, so these two star formations are like riders on opposite sides of a Ferris wheel. Looking northward, they rotate counter-clockwise around Polaris – the star that marks the sky’s north celestial pole – once a day. Approximately every 12 hours, as Earth spins beneath the heavens, Cassiopeia and the Big Dipper trade places in the sky.
Thus, around midnight tonight, Cassiopeia circles directly west (left) of Polaris, whereas the Big Dipper sweeps to Polaris’ east (right). Before dawn tomorrow, the Big Dipper climbs right above the North Star, while Cassiopeia swings directly below.
Bottom line: Watch the celestial clock and its two great big hour hands – Cassiopeia and the Big Dipper – as they swing around the North Star every night!
Tonight, look for the northern sky’s two most prominent sky patterns – the constellation Cassiopeia the Queen and the Big Dipper. Both circle around Polaris, the North Star, once a day. They are opposite each other, one on either side of the North Star.
Are you an early riser? Then use the waning moon to locate the planet Mars and the planet Spica before sunrise. Read more
At nightfall, the constellation Cassiopeia the Queen is easy to recognize in the northern sky, either in the evening or before dawn. This constellation is shaped like a W or M and contains five moderately bright stars. The distinctive shape of Cassiopeia makes her very noticeable among the stars of the northern sky.
And, of course, Ursa Major the Greater Bear – which contains the Big Dipper asterism – is one of the most famous of all star patterns. At nightfall this month, Cassiopeia shines high in the north while the Dipper lurks low. They are always on opposite sides of the North Star. From the southern half of the U.S., the Big Dipper is actually partially or totally beneath the horizon this month in the evening hours. North of about 40 degrees north latitude (the latitude of Denver, Colorado), the Big Dipper always stays above the horizon (if it’s level).
That’ll change as night passes, as the great carousel of stars wheels westward (counter-clockwise) around Polaris, the North Star. Polaris resides halfway between Cassiopeia and the Big Dipper, so these two star formations are like riders on opposite sides of a Ferris wheel. Looking northward, they rotate counter-clockwise around Polaris – the star that marks the sky’s north celestial pole – once a day. Approximately every 12 hours, as Earth spins beneath the heavens, Cassiopeia and the Big Dipper trade places in the sky.
Thus, around midnight tonight, Cassiopeia circles directly west (left) of Polaris, whereas the Big Dipper sweeps to Polaris’ east (right). Before dawn tomorrow, the Big Dipper climbs right above the North Star, while Cassiopeia swings directly below.
Bottom line: Watch the celestial clock and its two great big hour hands – Cassiopeia and the Big Dipper – as they swing around the North Star every night!
As 2015 comes to an end, I always love to review the top newly named species of the year. Here are the top 10 (in alphabetical order) as determined by an international taxonomist committee:
As 2015 comes to an end, I always love to review the top newly named species of the year. Here are the top 10 (in alphabetical order) as determined by an international taxonomist committee:
“If you see an antimatter version of yourself running towards you, think twice before embracing.” –J. Richard Gott III
Everywhere we look in the Universe, we find that planets, stars, galaxies, and even the gas between them are all made of matter and not antimatter. Yet as far as we know, the laws of nature are symmetric between matter and antimatter: you can’t create or destroy one without the other.
Image credit: Karen Teramura, UHIfA / NASA.
This question — why the Universe is full of matter and not antimatter — is one of the greatest unsolved problems in theoretical physics. Yet it’s also, conceivably, the one most likely to fall in the coming year! There are four compelling scenarios that might solve this question, that of baryogenesis, that theoretical physics has uncovered, and there’s a good chance that the LHC’s run II will be sensitive to two of them.
Image credit: E. Siegel, from his book, Beyond The Galaxy.
“If you see an antimatter version of yourself running towards you, think twice before embracing.” –J. Richard Gott III
Everywhere we look in the Universe, we find that planets, stars, galaxies, and even the gas between them are all made of matter and not antimatter. Yet as far as we know, the laws of nature are symmetric between matter and antimatter: you can’t create or destroy one without the other.
Image credit: Karen Teramura, UHIfA / NASA.
This question — why the Universe is full of matter and not antimatter — is one of the greatest unsolved problems in theoretical physics. Yet it’s also, conceivably, the one most likely to fall in the coming year! There are four compelling scenarios that might solve this question, that of baryogenesis, that theoretical physics has uncovered, and there’s a good chance that the LHC’s run II will be sensitive to two of them.
Image credit: E. Siegel, from his book, Beyond The Galaxy.
If you have had the news on the last day or two you may have seen stories and images about the Missouri floods. Many of those images are from Eureka (where we live), Pacific (where my wife Kellie works) and Valley Park (which is on my commute to work). That picture of the submerged McDonald’s you may have seen on the news is in Union, Missouri, about 20 miles to the southwest of Eureka
We are dry, mostly, and doing okay. The basement was flooded during the initial 3 day rain event due to a failed sump pump and a couple downspouts that came unattached from the drain pipes during the heavy downfall. The hydrostatic pressure of the ground water on the foundation was simply too much to hold back. We fixed the drain spouts and had a new sump pump installed on Sunday and that stopped any more water from coming in. We are fortunate that we returned home from visiting my family in Michigan on Saturday instead of Sunday or the water would have been much higher.
Unfortunately it doesn’t take much water to ruin carpet pads and drywall. My son and I were able to get the carpets up and the pads out the back of the house with a lot of labor but not too much trouble. There are now 14 high powered and very noisy blowers and a super-sized dehumidifier running non-stop in the basement at a cost of $30 per day per machine (disaster capitalism is quite profitable). We are told everything will be dried out in 2 to 3 days.
We have learned a painful and expensive lesson about not having a sump pump rider on our home insurance. The rider would have covered damages from the failed pump. We also would have been covered if our dishwasher had overflowed but not from ground water. Fortunately, because we acted quickly, we didn’t have any significant content damage so the only costs will be drying the place out and installing new pads under the salvaged carpets. Kellie thinks she is getting some new furniture out of the deal. I have no idea how less fortunate folks that have far more damage are going to get through this financially.
Flood lessons to pass along: check your sump pump, downspouts and your insurance policy. Keep important stuff up off the basement floor. Purchase a generator to keep the sump pump running when the power fails.
Downtown Eureka is a true disaster. The sand bagging effort was futile against the record water levels as most of the businesses downtown have water over their front doors. O’Dell’s, our favorite Irish pub, will be out of commission for a long time so now we have to go across the freeway to have good beer from the tap. The businesses Eureka residents depend on will be out of commission for many months.
Many homes along the river have been lost and are now downstream. These homes are built on stilts and have survived many flood events in the past but stilts can only go so high. We can no longer use the climate of the past to guide our decisions on the future. The rules for the game of life have changed and we must adapt to those rules.
Eureka has now had two 500 year floods in the last 22 years. The increasing frequency of these “500 year” (or more) type events really brings home what James Hansen wrote about in “Storms of my Grandchildren”. I’m pretty sure these frequency estimates will be a meaningless descriptor in the future. It will be interesting to see what the spring brings as the climate change fueled El Nino really kicks in.
All the roads out of Eureka were closed except for one and that one was a parking lot most of the time. Semi tractors on curvy and hilly two lane roads are not a good combination. Many subdivisions in the area have been isolated for a couple days now. The river crested around 6 last night so water levels, and media coverage, are quickly receding and moving downriver. We are looking forward to returning to some type of normalcy, and increased urgency for action on climate change, in the New Year.
If you want to help the best thing to do is to demand increased action on climate change from your political leaders.
We will need a price on carbon (see Citizen’s Climate Lobby), increased investment in energy efficiency, renewables and nuclear, and adaptation plans for the climate changes that are unavoidable. The American Red Cross is doing great work in helping people get through these disasters. I’m sure they could use your support.
If you have had the news on the last day or two you may have seen stories and images about the Missouri floods. Many of those images are from Eureka (where we live), Pacific (where my wife Kellie works) and Valley Park (which is on my commute to work). That picture of the submerged McDonald’s you may have seen on the news is in Union, Missouri, about 20 miles to the southwest of Eureka
We are dry, mostly, and doing okay. The basement was flooded during the initial 3 day rain event due to a failed sump pump and a couple downspouts that came unattached from the drain pipes during the heavy downfall. The hydrostatic pressure of the ground water on the foundation was simply too much to hold back. We fixed the drain spouts and had a new sump pump installed on Sunday and that stopped any more water from coming in. We are fortunate that we returned home from visiting my family in Michigan on Saturday instead of Sunday or the water would have been much higher.
Unfortunately it doesn’t take much water to ruin carpet pads and drywall. My son and I were able to get the carpets up and the pads out the back of the house with a lot of labor but not too much trouble. There are now 14 high powered and very noisy blowers and a super-sized dehumidifier running non-stop in the basement at a cost of $30 per day per machine (disaster capitalism is quite profitable). We are told everything will be dried out in 2 to 3 days.
We have learned a painful and expensive lesson about not having a sump pump rider on our home insurance. The rider would have covered damages from the failed pump. We also would have been covered if our dishwasher had overflowed but not from ground water. Fortunately, because we acted quickly, we didn’t have any significant content damage so the only costs will be drying the place out and installing new pads under the salvaged carpets. Kellie thinks she is getting some new furniture out of the deal. I have no idea how less fortunate folks that have far more damage are going to get through this financially.
Flood lessons to pass along: check your sump pump, downspouts and your insurance policy. Keep important stuff up off the basement floor. Purchase a generator to keep the sump pump running when the power fails.
Downtown Eureka is a true disaster. The sand bagging effort was futile against the record water levels as most of the businesses downtown have water over their front doors. O’Dell’s, our favorite Irish pub, will be out of commission for a long time so now we have to go across the freeway to have good beer from the tap. The businesses Eureka residents depend on will be out of commission for many months.
Many homes along the river have been lost and are now downstream. These homes are built on stilts and have survived many flood events in the past but stilts can only go so high. We can no longer use the climate of the past to guide our decisions on the future. The rules for the game of life have changed and we must adapt to those rules.
Eureka has now had two 500 year floods in the last 22 years. The increasing frequency of these “500 year” (or more) type events really brings home what James Hansen wrote about in “Storms of my Grandchildren”. I’m pretty sure these frequency estimates will be a meaningless descriptor in the future. It will be interesting to see what the spring brings as the climate change fueled El Nino really kicks in.
All the roads out of Eureka were closed except for one and that one was a parking lot most of the time. Semi tractors on curvy and hilly two lane roads are not a good combination. Many subdivisions in the area have been isolated for a couple days now. The river crested around 6 last night so water levels, and media coverage, are quickly receding and moving downriver. We are looking forward to returning to some type of normalcy, and increased urgency for action on climate change, in the New Year.
If you want to help the best thing to do is to demand increased action on climate change from your political leaders.
We will need a price on carbon (see Citizen’s Climate Lobby), increased investment in energy efficiency, renewables and nuclear, and adaptation plans for the climate changes that are unavoidable. The American Red Cross is doing great work in helping people get through these disasters. I’m sure they could use your support.
A follow up to the brilliantly successful the year in stoats: 2014. There can be no doubt about the picture of the year:
If you’re looking for a review of the climate-type events of the year then something like ATTP’s will be of use. This is one post per month from me, chosen without specific criteria. There was more science than I expected in the past year, but the march of politics continues inexorably.
A follow up to the brilliantly successful the year in stoats: 2014. There can be no doubt about the picture of the year:
If you’re looking for a review of the climate-type events of the year then something like ATTP’s will be of use. This is one post per month from me, chosen without specific criteria. There was more science than I expected in the past year, but the march of politics continues inexorably.
What was startling about it was that I’m getting used to mainly hearing from atheists calling me a mangina or such on that medium, so it was a break from the usual. On a lark I took a look at the video.
How anyone can be convinced by that babbling incompetent is a mystery — I guess he just tells them what they want to hear.
He has written a “book”, he says, titled “Darwin Skeptics: A Select List of Science Academics, Scientists, and Scholars Who are Skeptical of Darwinism“. It is what it says it is, a list of people with advanced degrees who are some form of creationist. There are 3000 names on it. I browsed it briefly before sending it off to the Science Inquisition (I lie — there is no science inquisition, and no one really gives a damn what nonsense you believe, as long as it doesn’t poison your teaching or research) and was unimpressed. Most of the people on it are not biologists, and most of those who are are antiquated emeritus professors. You will find cranks in every field of endeavor, and you quickly learn to ignore the noise and drill down to the substance.
He also says something interesting, and I even agreed with Bergman, briefly, which says that you’ll always find something. He quotes an Ernst Mayr article.
First, Darwinism rejects all supernatural phenomena and causations. The theory of evolution by natural selection explains the adaptedness and diversity of the world solely materialistically. It no longer requires God as creator or designer (although one is certainly still free to believe in God even if one accepts evolution). Darwin pointed out that creation, as described in the Bible and the origin accounts of other cultures, was contradicted by almost any aspect of the natural world. Every aspect of the “wonderful design” so admired by the natural theologians could be explained by natural selection. (A closer look also reveals that design is often not so wonderful—see “Evolution and the Origins of Disease,” by Randolph M. Nesse and George C. Williams; Scientific American, November 1998.) Eliminating God from science made room for strictly scientific explanations of all natural phenomena; it gave rise to positivism; it produced a powerful intellectual and spiritual revolution, the effects of which have lasted to this day.
I don’t think that’s at all true — we don’t exclude explanations a priori. I’m reminded of a famous Isaac Asimov quote: “The most exciting phrase to hear in science, the one that heralds new discoveries, is not ‘Eureka’ but ‘That’s funny…'” We’re always on the lookout for odd result that doesn’t fit our expectations, and when we get one, we’re going to take the whole system apart looking for an explanation. The thing is that “god” is not a particularly useful hypothesis, and it’s always going to be down near the bottom of any list of explanations, and in particular, the lack of any defined characters of this “god” being makes it awfully hard to test.
Remember the “neutrinos travel faster than light” anomaly? That was a good example. Nobody expected that neutrinos will travel faster than light, but they didn’t just reject results that suggested they did — they published them. Then they took everything apart trying to figure out what was going on, and eventually discovered an equipment error. “Faulty synchronization” turned out to be a more productive hypothesis than “God did it,” and so far that latter hypothesis has been a useless dud on every occasion it comes up. It’s not that scientists have a prior commitment to rejecting religious hypotheses, but that the theologians have given us such crappy definitions of their gods’ actions that we can’t evaluate them.
So it’s your fault, Jerry Bergman. Also, Mayr is often annoyingly wrong.
But my favorite part of the video starts at about 20 minutes and 20 seconds in. That’s where Bergman announces that everything, except subatomic particles, is irreducibly complex, and then spends the rest of the video explaining his brilliant idea that carbon is an example of an irreducibly complex molecule. He doesn’t even understand the concept he’s talking about!
Here’s Behe’s definition of the phrase:
An irreducibly complex evolutionary pathway is one that contains one or more unselected steps (that is, one or more necessary-but-unselected mutations). The degree of irreducible complexity is the number of unselected steps in the pathway.
Notice that he’s talking about “evolutionary pathways” and selected vs. unselected steps. Carbon was not produced by an evolutionary pathway, and every step in the process of nucleosynthesis (the reactions in stars that produce heavier atoms from hydrogen and helium) was unselected. Irreducible complexity simply doesn’t apply.
It also destroys the utility of the idea to creationists. They’re out to baffle people with elaborate analyses of molecular machines, remember; it’s just not as bewildering to lay people if you just point at an enzyme and say, Well, it’s got carbon in it, therefore god made it. Oooh, look, nitrogen. Well that does it — it’s just too complex for my mind to grasp.
What you need for the creationist concept of irreducible complexity is something complex, first of all; then it needs to be a collection of interacting parts, like a flagellum or a blood clotting pathway; and finally you need to be able to point to one piece of that complexity and say that you can’t imagine how it got there, and the whole thing falls apart if it’s not there. Carbon doesn’t fit that paradigm.
Where IC fails is in that word “selected”. Selection is important in generating functionality, but most of the features in any pathway will have arisen by chance processes — that is, they were initially unselected — and some of them will be shaped by selection into greater functionality. There will also be attributes that slip through the sieve of natural selection but do have functions. There is such a thing as constructive neutral evolution, and simple pathways tend to become more complex by the action of Muller’s Ratchet. Behe’s hypothesis can only be made in the complete absence of knowledge about how evolution actually works, relying on little more than a folk idea about how evolution operates only by natural selection. (Mayr also seemed to share that vision of evolutionary mechanisms, unfortunately.)
What was startling about it was that I’m getting used to mainly hearing from atheists calling me a mangina or such on that medium, so it was a break from the usual. On a lark I took a look at the video.
How anyone can be convinced by that babbling incompetent is a mystery — I guess he just tells them what they want to hear.
He has written a “book”, he says, titled “Darwin Skeptics: A Select List of Science Academics, Scientists, and Scholars Who are Skeptical of Darwinism“. It is what it says it is, a list of people with advanced degrees who are some form of creationist. There are 3000 names on it. I browsed it briefly before sending it off to the Science Inquisition (I lie — there is no science inquisition, and no one really gives a damn what nonsense you believe, as long as it doesn’t poison your teaching or research) and was unimpressed. Most of the people on it are not biologists, and most of those who are are antiquated emeritus professors. You will find cranks in every field of endeavor, and you quickly learn to ignore the noise and drill down to the substance.
He also says something interesting, and I even agreed with Bergman, briefly, which says that you’ll always find something. He quotes an Ernst Mayr article.
First, Darwinism rejects all supernatural phenomena and causations. The theory of evolution by natural selection explains the adaptedness and diversity of the world solely materialistically. It no longer requires God as creator or designer (although one is certainly still free to believe in God even if one accepts evolution). Darwin pointed out that creation, as described in the Bible and the origin accounts of other cultures, was contradicted by almost any aspect of the natural world. Every aspect of the “wonderful design” so admired by the natural theologians could be explained by natural selection. (A closer look also reveals that design is often not so wonderful—see “Evolution and the Origins of Disease,” by Randolph M. Nesse and George C. Williams; Scientific American, November 1998.) Eliminating God from science made room for strictly scientific explanations of all natural phenomena; it gave rise to positivism; it produced a powerful intellectual and spiritual revolution, the effects of which have lasted to this day.
I don’t think that’s at all true — we don’t exclude explanations a priori. I’m reminded of a famous Isaac Asimov quote: “The most exciting phrase to hear in science, the one that heralds new discoveries, is not ‘Eureka’ but ‘That’s funny…'” We’re always on the lookout for odd result that doesn’t fit our expectations, and when we get one, we’re going to take the whole system apart looking for an explanation. The thing is that “god” is not a particularly useful hypothesis, and it’s always going to be down near the bottom of any list of explanations, and in particular, the lack of any defined characters of this “god” being makes it awfully hard to test.
Remember the “neutrinos travel faster than light” anomaly? That was a good example. Nobody expected that neutrinos will travel faster than light, but they didn’t just reject results that suggested they did — they published them. Then they took everything apart trying to figure out what was going on, and eventually discovered an equipment error. “Faulty synchronization” turned out to be a more productive hypothesis than “God did it,” and so far that latter hypothesis has been a useless dud on every occasion it comes up. It’s not that scientists have a prior commitment to rejecting religious hypotheses, but that the theologians have given us such crappy definitions of their gods’ actions that we can’t evaluate them.
So it’s your fault, Jerry Bergman. Also, Mayr is often annoyingly wrong.
But my favorite part of the video starts at about 20 minutes and 20 seconds in. That’s where Bergman announces that everything, except subatomic particles, is irreducibly complex, and then spends the rest of the video explaining his brilliant idea that carbon is an example of an irreducibly complex molecule. He doesn’t even understand the concept he’s talking about!
Here’s Behe’s definition of the phrase:
An irreducibly complex evolutionary pathway is one that contains one or more unselected steps (that is, one or more necessary-but-unselected mutations). The degree of irreducible complexity is the number of unselected steps in the pathway.
Notice that he’s talking about “evolutionary pathways” and selected vs. unselected steps. Carbon was not produced by an evolutionary pathway, and every step in the process of nucleosynthesis (the reactions in stars that produce heavier atoms from hydrogen and helium) was unselected. Irreducible complexity simply doesn’t apply.
It also destroys the utility of the idea to creationists. They’re out to baffle people with elaborate analyses of molecular machines, remember; it’s just not as bewildering to lay people if you just point at an enzyme and say, Well, it’s got carbon in it, therefore god made it. Oooh, look, nitrogen. Well that does it — it’s just too complex for my mind to grasp.
What you need for the creationist concept of irreducible complexity is something complex, first of all; then it needs to be a collection of interacting parts, like a flagellum or a blood clotting pathway; and finally you need to be able to point to one piece of that complexity and say that you can’t imagine how it got there, and the whole thing falls apart if it’s not there. Carbon doesn’t fit that paradigm.
Where IC fails is in that word “selected”. Selection is important in generating functionality, but most of the features in any pathway will have arisen by chance processes — that is, they were initially unselected — and some of them will be shaped by selection into greater functionality. There will also be attributes that slip through the sieve of natural selection but do have functions. There is such a thing as constructive neutral evolution, and simple pathways tend to become more complex by the action of Muller’s Ratchet. Behe’s hypothesis can only be made in the complete absence of knowledge about how evolution actually works, relying on little more than a folk idea about how evolution operates only by natural selection. (Mayr also seemed to share that vision of evolutionary mechanisms, unfortunately.)
As 2015 draws to a close today, all I can think is: Another year in the can. Since my family is here, and it’s a holiday, I’m going to keep this one brief and wish everyone a Happy New Year.
In addition, I can’t help but wonder what’s going to happen in 2016. Who could have predicted that last year would begin with a measles outbreak centered at Disneyland that would end up inspiring a law in California that I never would have thought possible, namely SB 277, which eliminates nonmedical exemptions to school vaccine mandates. Who could have predicted that the antivaccine movement, in particular Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., would get all chummy with the Nation of Islam? Knowing that predictions are a fool’s errand, I still can’t resist making a few before I retire to my parents’ house to see sisters and my nephews. So here goes. Most predictions will be painfully obvious; some not. In 2016, I predict:
As the 2016-2017 school year approaches, which is the first year nonmedical exemptions will be banned, the antivaccine movement in California will get even crazier. (I know, I know. This is obvious, but I thought I’d start with low hanging fruit.)
Stanislaw Burzynski will slither away from justice yet again. (I really hope I’m mistaken about this one, but fear that I am not.)
Robert O. Young will also slither away from justice. (Again, I hope I’m wrong, but I’m in a pessimistic mood.)
There will be more measles and pertussis outbreaks, thanks to antivaccine loons. (Yes, this is a no-brainer.)
I will be depressed in May because, due to a conflict with my real job, I will not be able to speak at the Science-Based Medicine day of NECSS.
We will finally see the documents that the “CDC whistleblower” William Thompson gave to Rep. Bill Posey and that Ben Swann currently has. There will be no evidence in them that the CDC covered up a link between the MMR vaccine and autism in African-American boys, but antivaccine loons will do their best to spin it that way. (Some readers know that I’m cheating a bit on this one.)
The sham that is right-to-try will spread to most of the remaining states that haven’t passed it yet.
More academic medical centers will embrace quackademic medicine.
Finally, because of all these pessimistic predictions, there will be much Insolence in 2016.
Oh, and maybe I’ll have to attend one of these Michigan Psychic Fairs. They’re all over southeast Michigan, a couple of locations pretty close to where I live.
What are your predictions, my minions?
from ScienceBlogs http://ift.tt/1R1rVw0
As 2015 draws to a close today, all I can think is: Another year in the can. Since my family is here, and it’s a holiday, I’m going to keep this one brief and wish everyone a Happy New Year.
In addition, I can’t help but wonder what’s going to happen in 2016. Who could have predicted that last year would begin with a measles outbreak centered at Disneyland that would end up inspiring a law in California that I never would have thought possible, namely SB 277, which eliminates nonmedical exemptions to school vaccine mandates. Who could have predicted that the antivaccine movement, in particular Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., would get all chummy with the Nation of Islam? Knowing that predictions are a fool’s errand, I still can’t resist making a few before I retire to my parents’ house to see sisters and my nephews. So here goes. Most predictions will be painfully obvious; some not. In 2016, I predict:
As the 2016-2017 school year approaches, which is the first year nonmedical exemptions will be banned, the antivaccine movement in California will get even crazier. (I know, I know. This is obvious, but I thought I’d start with low hanging fruit.)
Stanislaw Burzynski will slither away from justice yet again. (I really hope I’m mistaken about this one, but fear that I am not.)
Robert O. Young will also slither away from justice. (Again, I hope I’m wrong, but I’m in a pessimistic mood.)
There will be more measles and pertussis outbreaks, thanks to antivaccine loons. (Yes, this is a no-brainer.)
I will be depressed in May because, due to a conflict with my real job, I will not be able to speak at the Science-Based Medicine day of NECSS.
We will finally see the documents that the “CDC whistleblower” William Thompson gave to Rep. Bill Posey and that Ben Swann currently has. There will be no evidence in them that the CDC covered up a link between the MMR vaccine and autism in African-American boys, but antivaccine loons will do their best to spin it that way. (Some readers know that I’m cheating a bit on this one.)
The sham that is right-to-try will spread to most of the remaining states that haven’t passed it yet.
More academic medical centers will embrace quackademic medicine.
Finally, because of all these pessimistic predictions, there will be much Insolence in 2016.
Oh, and maybe I’ll have to attend one of these Michigan Psychic Fairs. They’re all over southeast Michigan, a couple of locations pretty close to where I live.
