Cody Taylor

The Texas Board of Education — as discussed here last week — has voted on the guidelines for textbooks in that state, which represents a large enough market to have influence nationwide. The good news is that the board dropped a 20-year-old requirement that both “strengths and weaknesses” of all scientific theories be taught; score one for the teaching of evolution. The not-so-good news is that in a “compromise,” the board also voted to require that students “in all fields of science, analyze, evaluate and critique scientific explanations… including examining all sides of scientific evidence of those scientific explanations, so as to encourage critical thinking by the student.” Score one for the Discovery Institute. A Republican board member explained that the words “strengths and weaknesses” have become “code for creationism and [the similar theory of] intelligent design. So by being more clear in the language and using words that aren’t seen as code words, we were able to get all of the 15 board members to agree that this is how we’ll teach all sides of scientific explanation, using scientific evidence.” Reporting on the Texas vote is all over the map, as a US Today blog summarizes. Some reports claim that an amendment was passed that preserves a requirement that students study the “sufficiency or insufficiency” of common ancestry and natural selection. Other reports claim that the board also adopted language that would have students study the “different views on the existence of global warming.”

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RobGoldsmith writes in with news of the further adventures of Charles Simonyi, whose first trip to the ISS we discussed a couple of years ago. The Russian Soyuz vehicle carrying Simonyi and two others docked a day after the US space shuttle Discovery landed in Florida. “Space Adventures, Ltd. … announced today that its orbital client Charles Simonyi and his crew successfully arrived at the International Space Station after launching on-board the Soyuz TMA-14 spacecraft from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan on March 26. The spacecraft docked to the ISS at 9:05 am (EDT) with Dr. Simonyi and Expedition 19 crew members Russian cosmonaut Gennady Padalka and NASA astronaut Michael Barratt. They were greeted at approximately 12:30 p.m. (EDT) by the Expedition 18 crew…”

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On Wednesday, we discussed news that AT&T had begun sending takedown notices to users whom the RIAA has accused of illegally downloading copyrighted works. Cox and Comcast are both cooperating with the RIAA in that regard as well. However, while Cox seems willing to shut off service in the case of repeat offenders, Comcast denied that it was considering a similar penalty, and AT&T said they’ll flat out refuse to terminate service on the RIAA’s word alone; it will take a court order. They seem satisfied with the effect letters have had on inhibiting such downloads: “‘It’s a standard part of everybody’s terms of service,’ [AT&T senior executive vice president Jim Cicconi] said. ‘If somebody is engaging in illegal activity, it basically gives us the right to do it…We’re not a finder of fact and under no circumstances would we ever suspend or terminate service based on an allegation from a third party. We’re just simply reminding people that they can’t engage in illegal activity.’ Cicconi said the company began testing this kind of ‘forward noticing’ late last year and even experimented with sending certified letters. Cicconi said the notices worked. The company saw very few repeat offenders.”

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Technology Review has promising news on the AIDS front: researchers have captured HIV T cell transmission on video. The upshot could be new avenues of treatment. “The resulting images and videos show that, once an infected cell adheres to a healthy cell, the HIV proteins… migrate within minutes to the contact site. At that point, large packets of virus are simultaneously released by the infected cell and internalized by the recipient cell. This efficient mode of transfer is a distinct pathway from the cell-free infection that has been the focus of most prior HIV studies, and reveals another mechanism by which the virus evades immune responses that can neutralize free virus particles within the body.”

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Hugh Pickens writes “New cognitive research shows that 3-year-olds neither plan for the future nor live completely in the present, but instead call up the past as they need it. ‘There is a lot of work in the field of cognitive development that focuses on how kids are basically little versions of adults trying to do the same things adults do, but they’re just not as good at it yet. What we show here is they are doing something completely different,’ says professor Yuko Munakata at the University of Colorado at Boulder. Munakata’s team used a computer game and a setup that measures the diameter of the pupil of the eye to determine mental effort to study the cognitive abilities of 3-and-a-half-year-olds and 8-year-olds. The research concluded that while everything you tell toddlers seems to go in one ear and out the other, the study found that toddlers listen, but then store the information for later use. ‘For example, let’s say it’s cold outside and you tell your 3-year-old to go get his jacket out of his bedroom and get ready to go outside,’ says doctoral student Christopher Chatham. ‘You might expect the child to plan for the future, think “OK it’s cold outside so the jacket will keep me warm.” But what we suggest is that this isn’t what goes on in a 3-year-old’s brain. Rather, they run outside, discover that it is cold, and then retrieve the memory of where their jacket is, and then they go get it.'”

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his week several scary stories surfaced about how the MPAA and RIAA are negotiating with ISPs on how to deal with copyright infringers. Even though it was often presented as news, those who look deeper will realize that this is nothing new at all, just the same old threats dressed up in a new jacket.

newsblaze writes “The UN Human Rights Council assaulted free expression today, in a 23-11 vote that urges member states to adopt laws outlawing criticism of religions. The proposal came to the UN from Pakistan on behalf of the Organization for the Islamic Conference. There were 13 abstentions. South Korea, Japan, India, Mexico and Brazil, all strong democracies, allowed this to pass by abrogating their responsibility. While the resolution doesn’t mention the online world, where does this subject get mentioned most, if not online?” The coverage is from NewsBlaze, which says its mission is to carry important news that other media are not paying attention to. There does not seem to be any other coverage of this vote. Update: 03/29 00:48 GMT by KD : Reader kshade wrote in: “Actually this is covered by conventional media, even FOX news (Google News links). The absentees weren’t there because they boycotted the proposal.”

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theodp writes “When every student has a laptop, why run computer labs? That’s a question schools have been asking themselves as computer ownership rates among incoming freshmen routinely top 90%. After only four freshmen showed up at the University of Virginia in 2007 without a computer of their own, the school decided that it’s no longer worth the expense of running campus computer labs. Student computer labs have been a staple of campus life since the ’60s. So what are the benefits that will be missed as other schools follow UVa’s lead?” The university’s report notes understanding that “that students need collaborative space where they can bring their laptops and mobile devices to conduct group work, especially as the curriculum becomes increasingly team- and project-based.” One of the spaces formerly occupied by computer labs “has been transformed into a technology-rich collaboration area.”

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This week’s news coverage of another online storage company’s data loss has people weighing in on whether “cloud computing” storage poses an unacceptable security risk.

theodp writes “In The Civil Heretic, the NYT Magazine takes a look at how world-renowned scientist Freeman Dyson wound up opposing those who care most about global warming. Since coming out of the closet on global warming, Dyson has found himself described as ‘a pompous twit,’ ‘a blowhard,’ and ‘a mad scientist.’ He argues that climate change has become an obsession for ‘a worldwide secular religion’ known as environmentalism. Dyson has been particularly dismissive of Al Gore, calling him climate change’s chief propagandist and accusing him of relying too heavily on computer-generated climate models and promoting ‘lousy science’ that’s distracting attention from more serious and more immediate dangers to the planet.” Dyson himself wrote about the need for heretics in science not long ago.

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