Blindsight

At Not Exactly Rocket Science is a video of a man navigating a hallway filled with obstacles, even though he's completely blind--he has zero conscious awareness of visual perception and his visual cortex shows no activity when given visual tasks (most of which he fails), but he does have an ability known as blindsight. He became blind as a result of strokes which caused damage to the occipital lobe of his brain, including his visual cortex. Yet his eyes still function and there is still some visual processing occurring without rising to the level of conscious awareness. He can perform a number of visual tasks with perfect accuracy, even though his conscious perception is that he is simply guessing.

(Hat tip to Dan Noland for the link.)

Anthropogenic global warming debate

I just came across this post from Duae Quartunciae from July about the American Physical Society's publication of pro and con arguments on the subject of anthropogenic global warming, and I direct it to your attention now because it has a very lengthy, detailed, and respectful debate in the comments.

I recently heard Jane Orient of the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons speak about global warming (she thinks it's a pseudoscientific scam), in which she promoted the paper she published by Arthur and Noah Robinson and Willie Soon and the Petition Project. Before the event, I sent an email to the event organizer with links to Michael MacCracken's critique of that paper (PDF) and a wiki page critiquing the paper and the Robinsons' Oregon Institute of Science and Medicine (where Dr. Orient is listed on the faculty as a professor of medicine; she also teaches a course on "global warming controversies" for the Schlaflys' Eagle Forum University). While my links weren't redistributed to the other attendees of the talk, I did get a chance to express my skepticism in the discussion, which led to an email exchange with Dr. Orient.

She took the position that advocates of anthropogenic global warming are engaging in pseudoscience and are biased by their own need to keep up the hype in order to continue to receive government funding, but will ultimately be refuted by a growing disconnect between the projections of the climate models and the facts--she seems to think that the recent warming trends have been the result of solar irradiance and that we are now on a cooling trend. She stated in her talk that James Hansen is unreliable because he falsely claimed that 1998 was the warmest year on record, and was forced to retract it and admit that 1934 was the warmest year on record; and similarly was forced to retract an incorrect claim that October 2008 was the warmest October on record after Steve McIntyre found that there was an error in some of the reported data. I pointed out that her first claim is incorrect--1998 is still the warmest year on record for global temperatures, but the second-warmest for the contiguous 48 U.S. states after 1934, which is what Hansen said. And while she was correct about October 2008, after the correction it still remains the fifth-warmest October on record. The top three years for global temperatures are 1998, 2005, and 2002; the eight warmest years on record are all since 1998; the fourteen warmest years on record are since 1990.

I also pointed out Skeptic magazine's recent critique of the Petition Project, which she dismissed as a criticism of Robinson for not using methodology to do something he was not trying to do; that all he was trying to do is show that there is no consensus among scientists. I compared the Petition Project to the Discovery Institute's "Dissent from Darwinism," which she said she did not see as analogous.

We found some points of agreement--we both support the legitimacy of questioning, and of science over pseudoscience, though we disagree about who's doing science and who's doing pseudoscience.

UPDATE (December 16, 2009): The "Petition Project" isn't a petition of scientists, it's a petition of people with at least a bachelor's degree in a science-related field. Whittenberger at eSkeptic points out that the signature breakdown by level of education was 29% Ph.D., 22% M.S., 7% M.D. or D.V.M., and 41% B.S. or equivalent. By field, it was 12% earth science, 3% computer science or mathematics, 18% physics and aerospace sciences, 15% chemistry, 9% biology and agriculture, 10% medicine, and 32% engineering and general science. The percentage of Ph.D.s in relevant areas isn’t available, but it’s clear from the breakdown that at least two thirds have less than a Ph.D. and at least 80% do not have education in a relevant field. I conclude that it's not possible to conclude on the basis of that petition that there's dissent among scientists with relevant credentials--it is just like the DI petition in that regard.

Arizona Court of Appeals overturns CityNorth subsidy

The City of Phoenix's $97.4 million sales tax subsidy to the CityNorth retail center project in north Phoenix has been declared unconstitutional, a violation of the Arizona Constitution's gift clause. All three members of the appeals court agreed, writing in their opinion that "We think these payments are exactly what the Gift Clause was intended to prohibit."

The city's subsidy would have granted $97.4 million in sales tax revenues (or less, not to exceed 50% of the sales taxes collected by CityNorth businesses) over 11 years to the project developer, the Klutznick Company, in return for 3,180 parking spaces, including 200 parking lot spaces set aside for public use for "park and ride," for the next 45 years. The ruling found that the only public benefit for which the city could legitimately be paying were the 200 "park and ride" spaces, and that the city may still pay market rate for those 200 spaces (probably about $6 million over 45 years), but not for the other 3,180 spaces. The appeals court's ruling may be found here (PDF).

Congratulations to Goldwater litigation director Clint Bolick and the owners of the six small businesses that were plaintiffs in the case: Meyer Turken of Turken Industrial Properties, Ken Cheuvront of Cheuvront Wine and Cheese Cafe and Cheuvront Construction (and Democratic State Senator), Zul Gilliani who owns an ice cream shop at Paradise Valley Mall, James Iannuzo of Sign-a-Rama, Kathy Rowe of Music Together, and Justin Shafer of Hava Java.

The Goldwater Institute team initially lost the case, Turken v. Gordon, at the trial court level in Maricopa County Superior Court. The City of Phoenix tried unsuccessfully to get an award of $600,000 in attorney's fees from the Goldwater Institute in an attempt to chill future public interest lawsuits; now they'll no doubt appeal to the Arizona Supreme Court.

(Previously.)

More police puppycide

The cases continue to mount--when police officers come to search property and they are confronted by dogs, they often shoot and kill them, even if they are puppies.

A Milwaukee resident whose Labrador-Springer Spaniel mix was killed by police in 2004 has filed a lawsuit against the city, and she requested a list of every dog killed by city policy for the last nine years. There were 434--a dead dog every seven and a half days, and that's just one city.

In Oklahoma, a police officer pulled into a driveway to ask a woman for directions, and when the woman's Wheaton Terrier came bounding toward him, he shot and killed it. The police refused to do anything about the woman's complaint, and tried to pay her off to shut her up when she let them know that her security cameras had captured the incident. She also sued.

Radley Balko at The Agitator has been doing a great job of collecting and reporting on cases of unwarranted police killings of dogs. His latest summary of cases, from which the above two cases were taken, is his 16th "puppycide" blog post.

Unintended side-effects of speed cameras

In Montgomery County, Maryland, teens have found a new use for speed cameras--getting revenge on people they don't like or who have wronged them. Since the tickets from photo radar cameras are issued to the owners of the cars whose license plates are captured, they print out fake license plates on glossy photo paper, stick them over their own license plates, and then go out speeding.

This shows yet another flaw in the photo radar ticket process. I've speculated that registering your cars in the name of an LLC or trust is probably sufficient to make it difficult to assign individual responsibility to a speeding incident.

UPDATE (December 23, 2008): In Australia, an even more creative revenge against a mobile speed camera--have it issue tickets to itself! They could have just noted the plate number and followed the example of the Maryland teens, rather than stealing the actual plate... (Thanks, Adam, for the link.)

Diskeeper sued for Scientology indoctrination

Two ex-employees of Diskeeper Corporation have filed a lawsuit in Los Angeles Superior Court after being fired, charging that the company makes Scientology training a mandatory condition of employment. Diskeeper founder and CEO Craig Jensen is a high-level Scientologist (OT VIII) and member of the World Institute of Scientology Enterprises (WISE), which means that he follows Hubbard "management technology" in how he runs his businesses and donates a portion of revenues to the Church of Scientology.

UPDATE (December 25, 2008): Ed Brayton at Dispatches from the Culture Wars has more.

Arpaio foes arrested for clapping

Four people associated with the anti-Arpaio group Maricopa Citizens for Safety and Accountability, were arrested on Wednesday for standing and applauding a speaker at the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors meeting. The East Valley Tribune notes that:

A double standard clearly was in effect during the Board of Supervisors meeting Wednesday. At one point, public-transit advocate Blue Crowley used part of his public-comment time allotment to sing a birthday song to [MCBoS chairman Andy] Kunasek. Kunasek blushed and several people applauded, but none was ordered to leave or threatened with arrest.

However, Kunasek, deputies and security officers refused to tolerate applause after the anti-Arpaio speech minutes later.

The criminal clappers were charged with "suspicion of disorderly conduct and trespassing."

This brings the arrests of MCSA members to eight for the week and nine for the last four months.

Four other members of MCSA were arrested on Monday, after a group of 20 went to Andy Kunasek's office to talk with him and he refused to meet with them. Sheriff's deputies asked them to leave and arrested the four who refused.

The other arrest was MCSA co-founder Randy Parrez, who was arrested on September 29 outside a Board of Supervisors meeting on similar charges--suspicion of trespassing and disorderly conduct.

All but one of the members of the Board of Supervisors are Republicans. The Tribune article quotes Supervisor Max Wilson (R-District 4) as saying, "I don’t tell the police how to do their job. I don’t instruct them to do it or when to do it. They’re professionals at it and that’s the way they handle it." The lone Democrat, Mary Rose Wilcox (D-District 5), however, stated that she thought the arrests were excessive and that she would talk to security about it.

PATRIOT Act NSL gag order unconstitutional

For a second time, a U.S. appeals court has found unconstitutional the provision of the USA PATRIOT Act which forbids recipients of National Security Letters from disclosing that they have received them. After the first time around, Congress amended the law to introduce some minimal judicial review, but maintained the burden of proof on the recipient if the government claimed there were national security reasons for the NSL to remain secret. The courts have ruled that this burden needs to fall on the government.

If this continues to stand, then perhaps the rsync.net warrant canary will become superfluous.

Credit Suisse helps solve the toxic debt problem

In a fiendishly clever plan, Credit Suisse Group AG has found a way to reduce its exposure to toxic securities and transfer risk off its balance sheets--it's paying senior executives' bonuses with them.

Managing directors and directors, the two highest ranks at the Zurich-based company, will be paid year-end bonuses in its most illiquid loans and debt. Those assets will be transferred to a "Partner Asset Facility," and those directors will receive shares of ownership in the facility. Those assets will make semi-annual payments to the owners, with the full value only to be known as the assets mature or default.

A Very Merry Unauthorized Children's Scientology Pageant

Last night Einzige, frequent commenter Schtacky, and I went to see "A Very Merry Unauthorized Children's Scientology Pageant" in Tempe, put on by the Stray Cat Theatre. By lucky coincidence, local Scientology expert and critic Jeff Jacobsen was also attending (see his recent article), and we sat with him in the front row for what proved to be a very enjoyable performance.

On the way to work this morning, I heard Robrt Pela of Phoenix's New Times reading his review on the local NPR station, and his review describes our experience quite well:

About three minutes into Stray Cat Theatre's newest production, I found myself thinking: This can't be really happening. When you go to see it — and you must, if you do nothing else this holiday season, go see this astonishing stage production — you will almost certainly experience the same sense of delighted confusion. ... I rarely stopped laughing during this barely-hour-long show, and my single complaint about A Very Merry Unauthorized Children's Scientology Pageant is that it ended too soon.

The play was a special treat for those of us who already know something about Scientology and the life of L. Ron Hubbard.

The production tells the story of L. Ron Hubbard's life ("writer, explorer, nuclear physicist ...") and how he came to develop Dianetics and Scientology, in the form of a children's holiday pageant. Cheesy props and frequent costume changes are used to portray rapid changes of location, from Hawaii to New York to China. Much of what is presented is accurate--Hubbard's birthplace, some of his claims about his life, and especially the content of Dianetics and Scientology. A few liberties are taken in the story of his life, though fewer than Hubbard himself and contemporary Scientologists take in describing his achievements. While there are countless amusing and disturbing events of Hubbard's actual life that could have been used for comic relief but were omitted, we were surprised at how much they managed to pack into a short show. If you want the longer version, you can read Russell Miller's biography of Hubbard, Bare-Faced Messiah, online, complete with supporting documentation including paperwork from his FBI files.

The show continues tonight and tomorrow--if you have the opportunity to see it, take it, and you'll be very glad you went.