A newly-formed national group, Balanced Education for Everyone, has made a target of Colorado’s Mesa County in their fight to have Global Warming science stricken from the schools’ curriculum. Supporters of Balanced Education for Everyone, mostly Tea Party activists and Republican groups, believe that there is no evidence of global warming or of humanity’s influence on the global climate.

The vast majority of scientists recognize that Global Warming is happening, and that human activity plays a significant factor. It is as certain a scientific theory as the theories describing relativity, gravity, and evolution.

So why are large numbers of conservative political pundits and non-scientists in the general population so sure that the entire scientific community is wrong in this case?

For reasons that are unclear, Global Warming has been labeled as part of the “Liberal Agenda”, and therefore, to acknowledge it as scientific fact would be paramount to giving a green-light to other parts of the “Liberal Agenda”, whatever those are.

Science classrooms need to teach Science. This drive to change or eliminate the teaching of a well-supported scientific theory simply because a group of activists doesn’t believe in it, is an idiotic attack on science education. America is already falling behind most other Developed nations in terms of science and mathematics education. Petitions like this, that drive home to young minds the idea that accepted scientific facts can be changed just by “willing” them to change, will only help to further deteriorate America’s ability to compete technologically and scientifically in the 21st Century.

But more important than this, we are damaging our children’s ability to think analytically and scientifically. Science progresses, and theories that were once held as fact are dis-proven. But the most important thing to take away from this is that no theory has been dis-proven because a bunch of people didn’t believe in it, or because we refused to teach it to our children. Scientific theories are only dis-proven when a stronger theory displaces it, or scientific experiments prove it false. And to do this, you need to do science, not attack it.

A couple of wweks ago, I deactivated my Facebook account. I did this, not so much in response to the privacy concerns resulting from Facebook’s ever-changing, and ever shrinking commitment to its user’s privacy, but more in response to the attitude of Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg.

Mark Zuckerberg has repeatedly shown a complete disregard for the concerns of privacy advocates, and has a cavalier attitude toward his customer’s privacy. It is this attitude that led me to the deactivation of my Facebook account.

For reasons I can’t fathom now, I thought there would be a much larger backlash. Droves of people were going to leave Facebook, and I was going to be on the leading edge of the Great Emmigration. Unfortunately, I found out that Mr. Zuckerberg may be right. People simply aren’t concerned or don’t care so much about their privacy. In fact, most of my Facebook friends found it such a non-issue that they were unaware of what was going on. Why should he show concern over Facebook user’s privacy, when they themselves show no concern over it?

Meanwhile, I was missing a lot of what was going on. Nobody sends emails, or makes phone calls anymore. Nobody I know uses Twitter, or has a blog to keep people up to date on what they are doing. No, everyone uses Facebook, and my leaving left me out of the loop.

There is a lot wrong with Facebook, from privacy concerns to Farmville, but, at the end of the day, it is a tool to keep in contact with distant friends and acquaintances. And so, with some regret and chagrin, I reactivated my account and will remain on Facebook – at least until something better comes along.

Great idea. Lets hand out loans to companies that want to build nuclear power plants in the U.S. Since we know that nuclear power generation is completely unprofitable, the odds of us ever getting this money back is pretty slim.

Now I know that those of you on the left will argue about the dirtiness of nuclear power and the waste that is generated and the danger of accidents which can irradiate whole tracts of land. Those on the right will proclaim how nuclear energy does not pollute the atmosphere with greenhouse gases (curiously, they don’t believe in global warming, but they still insist on making this point); and how nifty it is.

But the fact is simple economics. There hasn’t been a nuclear reactor built in the US since 1970. This is because running a nuke plant isn’t profitable. The cost to build, maintain, and dispose of the waste generated outweighs the potential income over the 40-year life of the reactor.

Now, the Obama plan seems to be to make nuclear power profitable by subsidizing it with government money. This would be a good idea if it would generate jobs in the US. Unfortunately, since the US hasn’t built a nuclear reactor since 1970, nobody in America knows how to build one. So everything. . . EVERYTHING. . . will have to be outsourced to overseas firms. Sure, the guys who run the place after it is built will have jobs — but it wouldn’t matter if they were building a coal plant or a nuke plant, those folks would still have jobs.

So, overall, even apart from the environmental and health concerns over nuclear power, this is a really bad idea.

I opened a bookstore.

Time to fix. Yay!

Don’t ask

So I had to restore a backup. Sadly the latest backup was from February 11th. This sucks on a number of levels.

Its nice to have a social life that doesn’t involve a computer.

Monday I quit smoking at 3:00pm. Original Cindy called me at work, and let me know that she had quit and was having a rough time of it. Being the great guy I am, I told her that I was quitting with her. . and so it began.

Its been 43 hours now. Its hard but I know that the first three days are the worst. That’s the time it takes for your body to physically get over its nicotine addiction. After that, its all psychological.

Yes, I’m a geek.

But this year, I filed my taxes electronically (of course) and my tax return got REJECTED! This had never happened before. It turns out that someone else had claimed our foster daughter Alaxis. Since Alaxis lived with us for the entire year last year, I knew that nobody else had a legal right to claim her on their taxes.

Perplexed, I called the IRS to figure out how to fix this:

(After a 25 minute wait and three transfers)
IRS Agent: Can I help you?

TJ: Yes. I e-filed my tax return and it was rejected – someone else claimed one of my dependents. What can. . .

IRS: You need to file a paper return.

TJ: That. . that will fix it, will it?

IRS: You can’t e-file. File a paper return and we’ll sort it out.

TJ: Should I attach any supporting documents, or. . .?

IRS: (getting frustrated) Just file a paper return like you normally would (Translated: “This solution is so obvious, you must be retarded to not see it.”)

TJ: (thinking: “Like I normally would? I wouldn’t normally file a paper return.”) Uh. . . and you’re sure that will fix it?

IRS: File a paper return and we’ll review it. Is there something else you need? (translated: “get off the phone!”)

TJ: No, I guess that’s . . .

IRS: Thank you for calling the IRS help line *click*

So, I have now printed up a physical copy of my tax return and will mail it to the IRS today. This is so 20th Century, its like I’m in a time machine. Now I need to go buy some of those little sticky squares you put on envelopes so the Post Office will deliver them.