{"id":3434,"date":"2013-01-01T18:08:13","date_gmt":"2013-01-02T00:08:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/steve.cooleysekula.net\/blog\/?p=3434"},"modified":"2013-01-01T18:09:15","modified_gmt":"2013-01-02T00:09:15","slug":"from-the-blog-2012-in-review","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/steve.cooleysekula.net\/blog\/2013\/01\/01\/from-the-blog-2012-in-review\/","title":{"rendered":"From the blog: 2012 in review"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Here is a review of my favorite &#8220;blog moments&#8221; from 2012. Here&#8217;s to many more adventures of my pet hamster in 2013. I better have a bunch . . . otherwise, why write at all?<\/p>\n<p><strong>Favorite Photos<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Here are some of my favorite photos from the year.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/steve.cooleysekula.net\/blog\/2012\/08\/07\/park-falls-nature-and-industry\/\">Park Falls: Nature and Industry<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/steve.cooleysekula.net\/blog\/2012\/10\/15\/dallas-from-deep-ellum\/\">Central Dallas seen from Deep Ellum<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/steve.cooleysekula.net\/blog\/2012\/10\/15\/science-and-man-a-radiation-celebration\/\">Science and Man<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/steve.cooleysekula.net\/blog\/2012\/11\/03\/lightning-over-dallas\/\">Lightning over Dallas<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/steve.cooleysekula.net\/blog\/2012\/11\/25\/a-walk-through-allen-tx-in-the-fall\/\">A Walk Through Allen Texas in the Autumn<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/steve.cooleysekula.net\/blog\/2012\/06\/23\/the-pleasures-of-cooking\/\">Cooking for myself in Europe<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>Assessing Claims<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>In 2012, I taught SMU&#8217;s Cultural Formations B\/Physics 3333 with my colleagues and friends, Profs. Cotton and Scalise. In an attempt to hone my own &#8220;claim assessment&#8221; skills, I tried to practice what I was preaching when it came to claims that can be scientifically assessed. Here are a few of my favorites:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/steve.cooleysekula.net\/blog\/2012\/07\/22\/an-epidemic-of-gohmert-barber-syndrome-also-known-as-diarrhea-of-the-mouth\/\">An Epidemic of Gohmert-Barber Syndrome<\/a>: so many people said so many stupid and hateful things in the wake of a number of high-profile, violent public shootings, that Prof. Scalise and I named the problem: Gohmert-Barber Syndrome. What started as a way to collect a few stupid people&#8217;s really tasteless opinions turned into a soul-sucking documentary of the darkest corners of malignant thought in America. Do not enjoy this, and please use it as a cautionary tale for your children.<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/steve.cooleysekula.net\/blog\/2012\/01\/14\/remembering-the-hits-forgetting-the-misses\/\">Tim Tebow &#8211; is he really as good as people thought<\/a>? (spoiler alert: no)<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/steve.cooleysekula.net\/blog\/2012\/04\/14\/an-analysis-of-attacks-on-science\/\">An Analysis of Attacks on Science<\/a>: what is meant by &#8220;criticizing scientific weaknesses,&#8221; in reality vs. in attempts to pass laws to weaken science education<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/steve.cooleysekula.net\/blog\/2012\/04\/19\/an-open-letter-to-american-airlines-no-platform-for-avn\/\">Anti-vaccination messages on airplanes<\/a>? Here is my open letter to American Airlines, which originally planned to publish anti-vaccination nonsense on their airline media services. They later, <a href=\"http:\/\/steve.cooleysekula.net\/blog\/2012\/04\/22\/sign-the-petition-no-platform-for-anti-vaccination-message-on-american-airlines\/\">under strong criticism<\/a>, chose to NOT publish this life-threatening nonsense.<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/steve.cooleysekula.net\/blog\/2012\/04\/21\/certified-free-of-actual-science-content\/\">No GMOs in my food<\/a>! Since humans began agriculture, we&#8217;ve been genetically modifying food. We didn&#8217;t know that this is what we were doing until the late 1800s, when genetics was discovered, but we&#8217;d been doing it all along. Here is some anti-GMO nonsense from 2012.<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/steve.cooleysekula.net\/blog\/2012\/05\/09\/unethical-diet\/\">The hCG Liet<\/a> &#8211; when a diet is based on a lie, it&#8217;s not only stupid &#8211; it&#8217;s unethical and dangerous. The hCG Liet is a good example.<\/li>\n<li>In response to an evidence-free discussion of vaccines and autism on Facebook, I put together this resource: <a href=\"http:\/\/steve.cooleysekula.net\/blog\/2012\/08\/26\/resource-multiple-simultaneous-vaccinations-immune-compromise-and-autism\/\">do multiple vaccinations cause autism<\/a>? (spoiler alert: no)<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/steve.cooleysekula.net\/blog\/2012\/11\/10\/in-which-we-overdose-on-homeopathic-sleeping-aid\/\">Prof. Scalise and I disprove homeopathic medicine as actual medicine by overdosing on it<\/a>. Since we don&#8217;t know how to overdose on a medicine based on &#8220;dilution = potency,&#8221; he licks one pill and I down a whole bottle.<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/steve.cooleysekula.net\/blog\/2012\/12\/29\/claim-assessment-winter-break-edition-the-ford-dealer-email\/\">The &#8220;Ford Dealer Email&#8221; chain message<\/a>: is it possible that a single woman at a single car dealership getting $3250\/month from Federal assistance represents the root of all Federal spending problems? Is the story even true? Even if its true, can the author&#8217;s conclusions be correct? (spoiler alert: no to many of these)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>Politicians say the DUMBEST things<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>It&#8217;s clich\u00e9. Here are a few of my favorites.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Gov. Nikki Haley: <a href=\"http:\/\/steve.cooleysekula.net\/blog\/2012\/06\/21\/vetoing-a-vaccine-that-saves-womens-lives\/\">vetoes a vaccine policy<\/a> not because the vaccine is useless or unimportant, but because she fundamentally misunderstands womens&#8217; health and the natural world. Also, she says some super-dumb things to justify her actions.<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/steve.cooleysekula.net\/blog\/2012\/07\/20\/planks\/\">Texas Republican Party Platform Argues Against Critical Thinking<\/a>: it was badly written, was accidentally left in the platform document, and can&#8217;t be changed for two years. However you look at it, the Texas Republican Party did a really dumb thing.<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/steve.cooleysekula.net\/blog\/2012\/08\/14\/kentucky-legislator-ignorant-of-u-s-constitution\/\">Kentucky Representative Doesn&#8217;t Understand the First Amendment<\/a>: argues that Christian Creationism should be taught as science alongside the Scientific Theory of Natural Selection.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>Great Moments in the Use of Science!<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/steve.cooleysekula.net\/blog\/2012\/04\/22\/finding-fitbit\/\">Finding Fitbit<\/a>: when I lost my Fitbit, I used basic geometry and physics to triangulate its location. A proud moment!<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/steve.cooleysekula.net\/blog\/2012\/07\/22\/healthy-living-through-science\/\">How I used science to lose weight, decrease stress, and never needed the word &#8220;diet&#8221;<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Here is a review of my favorite &#8220;blog moments&#8221; from 2012. Here&#8217;s to many more adventures of my pet hamster in 2013. I better have a bunch . . . otherwise, why write at all? Favorite Photos Here are some of my favorite photos from the year. Park Falls: Nature and Industry Central Dallas seen [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"activitypub_content_warning":"","activitypub_content_visibility":"","activitypub_max_image_attachments":3,"activitypub_interaction_policy_quote":"anyone","activitypub_status":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-3434","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-life","7":"czr-hentry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/steve.cooleysekula.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3434","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/steve.cooleysekula.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/steve.cooleysekula.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/steve.cooleysekula.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/steve.cooleysekula.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3434"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/steve.cooleysekula.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3434\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3439,"href":"https:\/\/steve.cooleysekula.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3434\/revisions\/3439"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/steve.cooleysekula.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3434"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/steve.cooleysekula.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3434"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/steve.cooleysekula.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3434"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}