Whoops, I was wrong. Last week, I wrote that the so-called “supermoon” wouldn’t cause any problems, ‘cuz it’s a silly astrological concept with virtually no real-world significance. Read the debunking here! It’s great!Unfortunately, it failed to account for human boneheadedness, which often foils good science. Because while the supermoon was…
Ann Coulter says crazy things. She does it all the time, and most of us are used to it. But there’s crazy, see, and then there’s Crazy — the kind of blithely lethal insanity that’d make you scream and run if it weren’t proffered by a pretty, grinning, blond lady…
In South Florida, defending green space from a developer’s bulldozer is akin to protesting oil rigs in Texas. Yesterday, the activists attempting to block the construction of a new Scripps Research Institute biotech center in Palm Beach Gardens got a glimpse of how quixotic their quest may be.Two protesters camped…
Real quick: Saturday’s so-called “supermoon” won’t cause earthquakes, tsunamis, hurricanes, madness, or any significant uptick in theft/murder/mischief. In fact, the whole concept of the “supermoon” is bogus. Here’s why:The Moon’s Orbit. According to breathless reports in the Sun Sentinel and elsewhere, the “supermoon” has the moon “making its closest approach…
A week ago Monday, an observant worker at Kennedy Space Center noticed some unusual white powder laying about. (Where, exactly, we haven’t been told.) The worker alerted the proper authorities, the substance was tested, and whaddaya know? It was coke! A hefty 4.2 grams of the stuff. I don’t know…
Oh my, how depressing is today’s Palm Beach Post. A dead shuttle worker, a dead spring breaker, an old lady beaten at a bakery — and a Palm Beach Gardens psych teacher disciplined for talking sex with his students.The crime: Veteran educator Frank Rozanski presented his advanced psychology students with…
Rachel Kijewski has spent the last four days camped out 30 feet above ground, in the branches of a cluster of pine trees off I-95 in Palm Beach Gardens. She and other members of the environmental group Everglades Earth First are protesting a plan to build a Scripps Research Institute…
James Randi, the grandfather of modern skepticism and founder of the Fort Lauderdale-based James Randi Educational Foundation, has for decades offered a $1 million prize to anyone who can successfully demonstrate any paranormal ability in a laboratory setting. Now he’s extending the offer to manufacturers of homeopathic medications while at…
There’s a serious disconnect in how we Americans think about weather. On the one hand, we love crazy weather stories and the intense, irrational panic they cause. On the other hand, we’re absolutely unwilling to consider that those extreme weather patterns are a result of our own stupid behavior (i.e.,…
Last night, the universe decided to gift humans with an early Christmas present: a total lunar eclipse. This all came the morning of the Winter Solstice, the day of the year with the fewest hours of daylight for those of us in the Northern Hemisphere. Sure, lunar eclipses happen every year…
The anonymous, green-Lycra-clad student who dances around the Florida Atlantic University campus will unmask himself today in front of a group of what will likely include hundreds of people.Though the University Press, one of the school newspapers, reported his name after he was arrested on campus for disrupting a music…
Walk outside and take a look at the sky. You’ll see sunshine, and that’s because we had a pretty uneventful year when it came to hurricanes. Perhaps Mother Nature decided to give us a break since Republicans made it rain all over the House and Congress.Whatever the case, while doomsayers…
A story titled “Exotic Creatures Making Their Way Into South Florida” on the front page of Sunday’s Sun-Sentinel elucidated some of the dangers of the exotic-pet trade. Deep into the story’s second page, the pet industry was given its say. “A lot of children spend hours in front of the…
For more than a year, concerned families have been looking for answers about a disturbing trend of pediatric tumors and cancers around the Acreage, an unincorporated area between West Palm and Lake Okeechobee.Early this year, the Palm Beach County Health Department confirmed that a “cancer cluster” did exist — but…
Sometimes it helps to look abroad for one’s news to capture the peculiar absurdities of American politics. Case in point: The Daily Mail, of the U.K., yesterday ran an item discussing a potential chair of the U.S. energy committee, Congressman John Shimkus (R-IL). For Shimkus, it would be a breeze…
Since invading public consciousness years ago, the words West Nile instantly make people shudder. In fact, some of the most cautious people in Palm Beach have probably been wearing pants and long sleeves in the balmy days since October 26, when the county’s health department issued a mosquito advisory, the…
Two weeks ago, officials from the University of Florida announced that a moratorium would be placed on travel to Haiti for student projects. This was somewhat redundant: There already had been a moratorium on travel to Haiti for undergrads, because of unsafe conditions on the island resulting from the earthquake…
Florida’s Division of Emergency Management and the American Red Cross want you to participate in the 2011 Severe Weather Awareness Week.They want you to make a poster for each day of the awareness week (January 31 to February 4) with each poster representing their designated themes.We got very excited at…
Dr. Mark GeierThis week, Miami New Times has a story about Gary Kompothecras, the Sarasota chiropractor and close friend of Gov. Charlie Crist who’s been pressuring the Florida Department of Health to hand over sealed immunization records to a father-son team of anti-vaccination advocates.There are certainly multiple political factors at…
Rubio, a darling of Big Oil.Four months ago, as oil from the Deepwater Horizon disaster gushed into the Gulf of Mexico and threatened Panhandle beaches, Republican U.S. Senate candidate Marco Rubio stubbornly defended his support for offshore drilling.”The issue of offshore drilling is not going away, because America and the…
One of the world’s most famous skeptics was the keynote speaker at this weekend’s Singularity Summit at the Hyatt Regency in San Francisco.The annual event draws curious minds from around the globe to discuss a number of topics related to technological singularity, the theoretical moment in the future when a…
David Brady seems to be doing everything right in his campaign to win the Republican nomination in the 22nd Congressional District. It seems like Republican voters would want a moderate like Brady, who would seem to have a chance of winning swing voters in a general election against Democratic incumbent…
