Why Evolution is True is a blog written by Jerry Coyne, centered on evolution and biology but also dealing with diverse topics like politics, culture, and cats.
Tara Tanaka (flickr site here, Vimeo site here ) is brightening up our Friday with this lovely video of a determined brown thrasher (Toxostoma rufum) taking a bath. I’m hoping to put up one of her videos every Friday. Tara’s notes:
I’ve been slowly, painfully working my way through over 400GB of video I shot since August – trimming, naming, backing up – the “eating your vegetables” of videography. This morning I decided to treat myself to some “video dessert” and make a fun little video from something I just saw for the first time yesterday. I hope you enjoy it! Digiscoped with the GH4 using manual focus.
For best resolution (and it’s HIGH resolution!), be sure to put the on full screen (click the four diverging arrows), and then click on the “HD” feature, choosing 1080p. Comme ça:
It’s Friday! Even Professor Ceiling Cat (Emeritus) will rest a bit this weekend, getting ready for a busy week in Old Blighty. The good news is that my Indian visa has emerged from the bureaucratic labyrinth, so I’ll have my passport back for the England trip (travel to India commences in March). Wikipedia announced a “this day in history” event for January 29, 1967: “The ‘ultimate high; of the hippie era, the Mantra-Rock Dance, takes place in San Francisco and features Janis Joplin,Grateful Dead, and Allen Ginsberg.” I lived through the Sixties and have no memory of that event (there’s a joke here, but I won’t make it.) On this day in 1737, Thomas Paine was born, as well as Anton Chekhov in 1860 and Germaine “No Platform” Greer in 1939. Deaths on this day include those of H. L. Mencken in 1956 and Robert Frost in 1963. Meanwhile in Dobrzyn, Hili is pretending to conduct a scientific experiment. She’s rather crafty these days!:
A: I suspect that when you bite through this cord we will not be able to roll up or pull down the blinds.
Hili: This is a wobbly hypothesis but we have to test it.
In Polish:
Ja: Podejrzewam, że jak przegryziesz ten sznurek to nie będzie można ani spuszczać, ani podnosić rolet.
Hili: To jest chwiejna hipoteza, ale trzeba ją sprawdzić.
And Leon’s mountain vacation ended; it was too snowy for him to essay long hikes. But he’s helpful on the way home:
Leon: Are we going to drive through Szczaworyż?
Malgorzata’s explanation: Szczaworyż is a village. It is a very strange name which means “sorrel rise”. I suspect it is definitely unpronouncable for any non-Pole.
The most consumed fish in the U.S. are #1: tuna, and #2 salmon. What do they have in common? They’re “unfishy” fish, with a meaty texture and flavor. In fact, I frequently hear people say that they don’t like “fishy” fish, which means that they don’t much like fish.
I know a lot of people will write in angrily and say they love fish, and love fishy fish like anchovies and herring. I recognize that you people exist, but I am making a general argument, one supported by the data above. (Another non-fishy fish that’s highly prized, by the way, is swordfish.)
Full disclosure: I am not much of a fish fan, and when I do eat it it, it’s tuna or salmon.
p.s. Be temperate in your remarks below: remember there are rules about calling people names. Try not to carp too much.
A new Texas law that goes into effect on August 1 will allow all students to carry concealed weapons on public university campuses and inside classroom buildings (some exceptions can be made by university administrations). It’s a dreadful idea, predicated on the notion that if the students are packing heat, it will deter terrorists or other crazies who want to attack campuses. (I can imagine the carnage in a classroom shootout like that!) Private universities are exempt—for the time being.
Given that it’s a law, there’s not much one can do but challenge it in court. But one professor, and someone I know and respect, is simply committing civil disobedience, telling students he won’t allow guns in the classroom.
According to PuffHo, renowned and Nobel-winning physicist Steven Weinberg (also an atheist) has announced that he’ll try to ban guns in his University of Texas at Austin classroom this fall:
Steven Weinberg, who won the top prize in science in 1979, said at the university’s faculty council meeting that he understands the decision could leave him vulnerable to a lawsuit. Most university task forces across the state have found that Texas’ new campus carry law prohibits such a ban. But Weinberg said he believes that he would eventually win that suit, because forcing professors to allow guns quashes constitutionally protected free speech and academic freedom.
“I am willing by my own actions to expose myself to this,” he said. “Let’s have it heard. We should allow the courts to decide it.”
Yes, I think he’ll be sued, and I’m glad he’s willing to take the heat (so to speak) and fight this thing up through the courts (I’m sure the American Civil Liberties Union will help, although I can’t really see this as a free-speech issue.) But Weinberg’s in for a hard time, for even the University’s lawyers disagree with him:
UT-Austin officials charged with reviewing the law were unconvinced. Steven Goode, a UT-Austin law professor and chairman of the university’s campus carry task force, said his group reviewed banning guns in classrooms and decided that it violated the new law. Attorney General Ken Paxton has agreed in a written opinion issued last month.
“I think that the notion that a First Amendment claim would win in court against [the campus carry law] is an illusion,” Goode said. “I think it is an extraordinarily weak argument.
. . . At UT-Austin, President Greg Fenves appointed a task force to review the law and suggest rules. That task force has recommended banning guns in dorms and allowing professors to ban guns in their individual offices. But it said that bans in classrooms went too far.
Fenves, who hasn’t yet weighed in, said on Monday that he expects to propose his rules by mid-February. But in comments to the faculty council, he indicated that he would have to stick with state law. When asked whether professors can require students with handguns to sit in the back of the classroom, for example, Fenves said he didn’t think so.
“As a public university, I am obligated to seeing that we carry out the law,” Fenves said.
I have a lot of friends who teach at UT Austin and other public universities in Texas, and I wouldn’t like to be in their shoes. I simply can’t imagine teaching knowing that students are sitting in front of me with pistols. What if they get mad?
At any rate, Weinberg has guts, and although he’ll probably lose, I applaud his chutzpah.
According to the BBC, a 28-year-old man was just arrested at the entrance of Disneyland Paris carrying two guns, a box of ammunition, and a Qur’an. A female companion was also arrested.
And that’s all I know. It’s a mercy they caught him, for there’s no limit to the number of innocents Islamist terrorists want to kill. (Let me add that there’s a remote possibility that this was a stunt designed to rouse anti-Muslim sentiment, but I doubt it.)
During the student protests at the University of Missouri, communication professor Melissa Click tried to obstruct student journalists covering the protests, which were taking place in a public space.
Student Tim Tai tried to take pictures and, as the following video shows, was rebuffed not only by the students, who tried to kick him out of that public space (a First Amendment no-no), but also by Click, who should have known better. She appears at 7:12 in this video, all worked up, telling the student that he needs to get out, calling for “some muscle over here” to kick the student out of the area, and, apparently, trying to snatch his camera.
Of course the students had every right to protest, and there was apparently a climate of racial bigotry that led to the protests, but Tai also had a right to report on any protests in public spaces.
Click herself, aware that her job was on the line, issued an apology, but it wasn’t really an apology, for she excused her behavior due to the actions of “spirited reporters”:
“I regret the language and strategies I used, and sincerely apologize to the MU campus community, and journalists at large, for my behavior, and also for the way my actions have shifted attention away from the students’ campaign for justice. My actions were shaped by exasperation with a few spirited reporters.”
Over at CNN, Marc Randazza, a First-Amendment lawyer, television commenter, and blogger, discusses her case and suggests what should be done with Click. It’s a thoughtful and reasoned analysis, and he concludes that criminal charges were unwarranted (Garrett Epps at The Atlantic agrees):
Just like Beetlejuice, the “muscle” arrived. Now [Click] is being criminally prosecuted for third-degree assault, a misdemeanor. She raised the stakes on foolishness, behaving like an over-privileged brat, thinking that the gun would never point the other way. After all, she was championing “social justice,” and as we have seen in the past, champions of this brand of leftist thought believe that their ends justify any means. Click decided that she was there to champion her political brand, and if it meant threatening a journalist, then that was the politically correct thing to do.
She was no longer an educator; she was a thug, calling for violence to suppress legitimate reporting. And how strange it is that the academic left was so quiet. When Donald Trump throws protesters or journalists out of his rallies, he gets (well deserved) scorn for it. After all, he is on the “other team.” But, when someone like Click calls for violence against a journalist to stop him from reporting, we hear crickets from “my side” of the political divide.
. . . The prosecution, like Click’s behavior, is politically motivated. She isn’t being prosecuted because of what she did, she’s being prosecuted because of what she represents. Now we have one disproportionate response met with another. We have a situation where disrespect for basic liberties, once unleashed, is out of control.
The correct response to excess is not more excess. What Click did might be technically illegal, but it does not warrant this selective prosecution. Click should be marched off of campus and into the unemployment line, but not into a jail cell.
I agree with Randazza. If the students weren’t prosecuted for similar actions, why Click? Sure, she was a communications professor and should have known better about how to act, but I don’t think she “assaulted” Tai any more than the other students. And it’s clear that a pack of Republicans is behind the prosecution.
Should she be fired? I go back and forth on this one. Her actions were out of line, her apology unconvincing, but firing is a serious action. In the end, though, I come down with Randazza that she should be booted out of Missouri because her actions were not befitting a faculty member in a communications department, and because of her “call for muscle,” i.e., using her authority to enlist physical force to give Tai the boot.
And, sure enough, Click was just let go—temporarily. When looking up what had happened to her, I found a three-hour-old report from the St. Louis Post-Dispatch that Click was suspended last night by the University’s Board of Curators. This is not a permanent dismissal, which apparently depends on the results of the court action:
In a prepared statement, UM Board of Curators chairwoman Pam Henrickson said the board had directed the university’s general counsel to conduct an investigation to determine whether more discipline was necessary.
. . . This week, interim Mizzou Chancellor Hank Foley resisted calls to fire Click. He said he would wait for due process to play out.
Click is scheduled to be back in court on Feb. 16.
Whether or not she’s convicted or fired, she’ll have learned a lesson—a lesson that should be imparted to all students who are protesting in public. If you do that, you don’t have a right to selectively decide whether journalists can cover your actions, or whether some journalists but not all can be kicked out.
