Agassi Couldn't Clone a Sheep, Could Probably Still Beat Us Up

What is it about science and coolness that just can't seem to coagulate? Like oil and water, the two have been diametrically opposed seemingly since the beginning of time. Historically speaking, I think the rift developed somewhere around the time the church shunned scientists and general "thinkers" for positing that the universe wasn't earth centric. As we evolve and change, the same battle remains, albeit with less pyrotechnic penalties for losing. Where it once manifested as the Ionian philosophers challenging the clergy, it now takes a fresh form, as a new girl at tennis camp struggling to fit in with the hip, hard-edged, rough-ridin' American tennis players.

NOVA recently introduced us to Yoky Matsuoka, a girl who once labeled herself an airhead to fit in but went on to become one of the world's most preeminent neurobiologists. The story centers on Yoky, her incredible achievements, and especially her plight to become culturally accepted.

I found this to be a struggle I can identify with in many respects. I'm a former tennis zealot and once-closeted science geek who shunned an engineering major in favor of a much more swanky art studio title. Sure, I got the look down. My DIY shirts are one of a kind [possibly because you did them yourself —ed] and I'm quite sure my pants have faded to reflect a perfect shade of trendy indifference. But as the sun sets and I lay my vinyl to rest, I don the glasses of ridicule to watch Cosmos and drift into dreams of the Library of Athens.

I have a profound respect for science, scientists, logic and experimentation, but I can't help but wonder why, in all this battle to uncover the secrets of the universe and the harmony of the spheres, the hard sciences have failed to attempt to alter the harmony of the social spheres. Yoky is making great advances building the perfect robotic hand, and other scientists are planting electrodes into the brains of monkeys so robotic limbs can be controlled purely by monkey thought (I can see the headlines now: "Amputee Monkeys Able to Fling Poop Once Again" and "Indefatigable Monkey Arms Work Typewriter but End Up Writing MacBeth"). Aren't we coming one step closer to controlling someone else's thoughts? And if so, will we use it to our advantage?

It's my understanding scientists are a generally passive breed. Eddie Izzard does a nice bit about an evil giraffe, and the concept of an evil herbivore in general and I find the same sense of absurdity attached to the term "evil scientist". Other than the mad scientists of lore, buried deep in a basement bedazzling that the final rhinestone on their robots brow of hatred I get the sense that science is a pretty friendly community. But is it a unity created only by a mutual lack of belonging to the "other," or rather a mutual understanding about the eventual domination of the scientist breed? Perhaps it's more sinister than I ever imagined. Sure, common folk currently know Angelina Jolie's babies' names without ever having seen the Phoenix spacecraft photos, but when scientists are the puppet masters, will happenings in Second Life make headline news, and Spore consistently outsell Grand Theft Auto?

Perhaps this is all hulaballoo and we're all much too smart to go about changing a social order, and (almost) everyone knows that. At this point, it'd probably be easier to create a race than to alter the existing one anyway so let's say fuck it and assimilate, knowing that we've got a winning hand. [Get it? 'Cause Matsuoka does prosthetic limbs? It works on two levels! —ed] And let's elect a scientist to office while we're at it. There a stretch for ya. A campaign based entirely on algorithms, and all the Bionic Fundraising Monkeys you could dream of.

{from NOVA, like it ain't no thang}

Children with Autism Revealed as Fakers, Apologize, Write That Sestina They've Been Withholding Out of Spite

Michael Savage, right-wing radio host, recently decreed that the majority children on the autism spectrum are not afflicted, impaired beings, but simply "screaming brats." To claim that "there is no autism epidemic" not only wholly undermines the feisty and heartfelt-savvy activism to which celebrities like Jenny McCarthy and Toni Braxton sort-of-sometimes-not-really contribute, but derails what little attention this disorder grabs from anybody. How much coverage did that "Hero"-ic pixie Hayden Panettiere get for rallying to save a few whales? Compare that to how often you see an advert for autism awareness, hell, see a child with autism in public at all. Parents are embarrassed of and terrified for their children and Savage feeds into these constricting emotions with his radical exaggeration that "99 percent of the cases [are] fraudulent." A child who cognitively chooses to whine or screech in order to communicate should never be compared to a child who may not ever emit a communicative sound—and if she does, tone or volume should not be the focus of such a breakthrough.

Savage further disregards a disorder that has existed for hundreds of years, a disorder that was, until recently, considered to be hopeless in terms of progress. Would he prefer to incarcerate any person who exhibits tantrum-like or "moronic" behavior? Or, would be prefer mechanical and chemical restraint on a child so progress would never be an option? Let Savage attempt to diagnose and implement a behavior plan for why a child head-bangs until he gets rug burns on his forehead, why he is terrified of scissors, or why he does not bathe without crying. Possibly then the true moron will be identified.

Perhaps as sickening as a man who glibly insults damaged children is a country that doesn't object: Savage is still the third-most listened-to radio host in America. Protests have risen in major cities, and there is a movement to fire the man. Participation in the latter would not only relieve some of our communal nausea but alert our nation to the true devastation of developmental disabilities.

[Weiner—Savage's real name is Weiner, folks! Ha! Mock him! Mock him fast! Mock him now!—sort-of-somewhat-not-really withdrew his statement. Which, in LW's eyes, in no way recuses him from the discussion, since the job of a talkshow host has, for a decade at least, been to mirror the ugliest desires, convictions, and superstitions of his/her/Odo's listenership. Add in the fact that he actually has a fucking doctorate in something vaguely health-related, and you have to imagine that, essentially, he is either the worst doctor ever (apologies to Drs. Mengele and Moreau), or else has trained himself to not actually possess any true opinions beyond what sells ad time. Either way, apologies and retractions work (badly) when the problem derives from a moral failing; this was a deliberate dissemination of false information. As long as there is any confusion in the public sphere, this shitbag deserves no grace. —Ed.]

{from Gawker, because there's two kinds of asshole in the world, and only the good kind doesn't have kids who peddle sugar-spiked caffeinated nail-polish remover to children}

Nach Uh-Oh

A salmonella strain found in fresh jalapenos has made 1,251 people sick, 229 of whom had to be hospitalized.

Agricola Zaragosa, a Texan agricultural distribution facility, has been implicated in the contaminated peppers; however, the peppers originated in Mexico, and now public health officials on both sides of the border are engaged in Richards/Sheen-y yes-you-did no-I-didn't silliness.

Salmonella-induced illness—which includes diarrhea, fever, and cramps—likely occurring from pepper snacking has been identified in 43 states. According to the Food and Drug Administration, which tracked down the source of the infection, and is consequently so proud of itself that it's taken a shine to the third person:

"FDA is also asking consumers to avoid eating raw jalapeno peppers or foods made from raw jalapeno peppers until further notice in order to prevent additional cases of illness. ... FDA is continuing to advise that people in high risk populations, such as elderly persons, infants and people with impaired immune systems, avoid eating raw serrano peppers or food made from raw serrano peppers until further notice."

Serrano? Apparently the dumb 'nillas have added peppers to the list of things they can't tell apart.

Pickled jalapenos are fine, by the way. Just not the La Morena brand—whether or not Amazon wants to call them "gourmet food"—as they are profoundly fucking foul.

{from Reuters UK, in what Lunar Weight suspects must be some British culinary response to the Zimmerman telegram}

Schooled Like a Fish (Bite Us)

We got the start date for Shark Week dead wrong.

From our friendly neighborhood Discovery Channel press being, possibly in an attempt to smother Lunar Weight with kindness and turn us into corporate shills (hey buddy, it'll work, trust us; the secret is schwag. We'd like a Les Stroud action figure with kung-fu grip and Real Dehydration-Induced Hallucinations™):

"I noticed you accidentally put June 27th as the start [for Shark Week] date though... it's actually July 27th (at 9PM with a Mythbusters special) which is what I'm sure you meant. Unfortunately there is no Shark Month & One Week celebration yet."

Whoops. We blame all the drugs we're not doing.

{from the minds behind Shark Week to the shitforbrains at Lunar Weight}

Son of a Pitch

"They just grow up and blow their elbows out so fast these days." The American Orthopedic Society for Sports Medicine released a report today detailing a surprising increase in the rates of ulnar collateral ligament (UCL) replacement surgery. Fully a third of all these "Tommy John" surgeries—which replace a ligament that is almost exclusively torn by throwing a baseball—were performed on kids high-school age or younger, an increase of over 20% in the last ten years.

In unrelated news, the American Association for Overbearing, Narcissistic Fathers Who Can Only Quash Their Feeling of Failure and Ennui by Living Vicariously Through Their Spawn reports that membership is up over 20% in the last ten years.

{from the American Orthopedic Society for Sports Medicine}

The Week in Sharks: ...and Other Things that Like the Taste of Seal

"In fashion, you're either in or you're oh god oh god my leg." Heidi Klum—supermodel, erstwhile fashion svengali, and all-around German person—considers scuba-diving in shark infested waters to be her bravest moment ever.

Even braver, the New York Daily News gushes, than "showing off her pregnant belly in tight outfits on Bravo's 'Project Runway,'" because fat people suck and are from space.

In her Parade Magazine interview, Klum explains how the shark schmooze helped her conquer her fears. "I'm not saying that everyone should swim with sharks," she says, "but sometimes you have to jump over your own shadow in order to learn something that you will never forget for the rest of your life." Such as, say... optics?

Klum made the dive as part of the Discovery Channel's Shark Week in 2003, which further goes to prove Lunar Weight's point.

Bollywood icon Zayed Khan also got fabulous with the cartilaginous. On a recent underwater shoot, he basically bro'd out with his toothy would-be antagonists. "They came and flapped their bodies next to us and slapped our shoulders like buddies," Khan told the Times of India. Little did he know they then turned around and put most of the contents of his trailer on eBay, since no one likes to work for scale. Or for denticle.

{from Parade and the Times of India, respectively; Lunar Weight hereby humbly threatens to bite Zooey Deschanel if it'll get her to consider hanging out with us an honor}




Or maybe Zooey'd dig us if we "sharked ourselves". As part of the Shark Week promotional run up, Discovery.com offers you the chance to morph yourself into that manic, sodden, Dunst-mouthed freak on their billboards.

Discovery's own flacks describe the e-mutilator as "totally viral." By which they presumably mean "akin to having smallpox." Since what those earnest nerdlings who haven't grown to embrace their own inherent attractiveness really need is a way to obliterate said attractiveness entirely.

Oh well. It beats blatant, unrepentant racism.

{from Discovery.com, who, to be fair, probably hate themselves as much as they hate their audience}




LW appreciates a good chomping in the name of class warfare, but it ain't gonna happen this time. A Great White sighting off the coast of Martha's Vineyard was reported, but an airborne search by what Bloomberg referred as "a fish spotter" failed to find confirmation.

The search failure may, in part, be due to the fact that people were making that shit up.

Because everyone's kinda bored right now.

Fortunately, some good came out of the silliness. The press managed to cite Jaws at every fucking opportunity, because, epistemologically speaking, nothing can be considered to possess material or temporal form unless Steven Spielberg has made an ass-ton of dough off of it.

{from the Boston Globe, and every bored hack stuck at a science desk bitterly driving staples into a Malcolm Gladwell voodoo doll}




Biologist-poet describes a whale shark on the move as "a bird as large as a bus". Though humans only ever encounter whale sharks placid and (prosaically) tail-propelled near the surface, when at depth, these largest-of-all-fish use gravity, fins, and the always-good-for-party-conversation laws of fluid dynamics to glide through the water column.

This unique method of swimming could be a means to conserve energy, or it could be an attempt to get Gerard Manley Hopkins to take that stupid windhover and shove it.

{courtesy FOX News, which claims to also have a whale shark video, but when LW clicks on the imbed, it plays lots of footage of Heath Ledger gallivanting about looking like a cross between Steven Tyler and a White Stripes groupie, then freezes}

UCSB Researcher Reveals Patterns of Extinction, Biodiversity; UCSB Graduate Nurses Hangover, Regrets

John Alroy of the University of California, Santa Barbara, utilized computer modeling to revamp the geological picture of planetary extinction/diversification patterns. Lunar Weight, ourselves a product of said esteemed University, stayed out 'til 3 a.m. and were late to work. Again.

Alroy and colleagues' research overturns conventional wisdom that There have been five or six mass extinctions since life began on Earth, suggesting instead that there were only three or four.

LW overturned a glass of orange juice and got it all over the floor and left it for our roommates to clean up because, as we said, we were late.

Alroy's work, which samples the overall rates at which fossils of specific families and species appear in rock strata of specific ages, redraws the accepted mathematical models for species diversification, which are based solely on the earliest and latest appearances of each species. Alroy's curve looks like a plateau, with a rapid increase in biodiversity followed by a "leveling off" where no new species appear, instead of the old model's assumption of constant species replenishment.

LW's work involved redrawing Beavis. You wouldn't think it's hard, but something about the lower jaw just gets us. Oh, whoops, we were supposed to fetch that file half an hour ago. Coffee. Something fried. Ugh.

The University of California at Santa Barbara: we make winners.

{from Eurekalert, and read to us by kindly old librarians who know there's beauty inside the heart of us young hoodlums}

June 27th: Shark Week to Begin, All Chance of Sex to End

The Discovery Channel just released the lineup for this year's Shark Week. Shark Week runs June 27th through August 2nd, putting the "yes!" in "chondrichthyes!"

We'll quickly editorialize here regarding a persistent flaw in the week-long celebration of all things aquabitey: documentaries about shark attacks are not shark documentaries. They are documentaries about people stupid enough/delicious enough to get bitten by sharks. If we wanted to watch Eating Stupid/Delicious Person Week, we'd release barracudas into Heidi Montag's swimming pool.

Still, we're anticipating a week of denticles and Dewar's. We may even try to liveblog it, though the majority of our speech will consist of "Dude! See that? Awesome!"

Though to be fair, it's never not fun to watch Les Stroud find new and innovative ways of getting himself killed.

{from TV Squad; show descriptions in the lede link, if you have no faith in sharks to be unconditionally awesome (though that makes you a dirty dirty sea lion lover, ork ork)}

Fossil Flatfish One-Up God, Look Both Down and Up on His Creation

Fossilized fish with fucked-up faces delight Darwinists, further malign Ben Stein.

In one more indication that the world is going to halibut in a handbasket, Matt Friedman, a University of Chicago grad student, identified three related fossils that may be the missing links between the suave, symmetrical fish we know and love and the flounderish, filet-able freaks known as flatfish, which have both eyes on one side of their body.

These cock-eyed beasties still have eyes on opposite sides of their head, but one has migrated towards the top of the skull, making them look like, well, idiots—but idiots that evidently gained some sort of survival advantage (Not Exactly Rocket Science speculates that the fish may have used the "normal" eye to scan the underwater environment while "its head was lifted just high enough above the surface to give [the other eye] a view").

Aside from helping better trace the tree of life, Friedman's finds help undermine the distinctly American brand of anti-intellectual sophistry known as "Intelligent Design," or I.D. In brief, this school of thought holds that the natural world is too "perfect" to have evolved by the gradual selective pressures called for by evolutionary theory, therefore must have been cut from whole cloth by a sentient being.

The crux of this argument is what's known as irreducible complexity, as promulgated by Michael Behe. The idea is that certain biological structures (Behe's baby is a certain bacterial flagellum) have no benefit to survival and reproduction unless their many parts are all interlocked. Therefore, there's no way each piece could've come about separately through natural selection and differential reproductive success.

NOVA already demonstrated that Behe is full of shit, and used pretty pretty computer graphics to do so. (LW will link to the "Judgment Day" episode whenever possible, as I.D. is the genital herpes of the scientific establishment—impossible to get rid of and prone to ruining everyone's fun)

Nonetheless, flatfish have often been held up as another indication of irreducible complexity, since, until now, there was no series of fossils showing an eye slowly and steadily making its way across animal after animal to join up with its counterpart on the other side. Friedman's find shows that—and for the love of finches, this should be obvious already—just because we haven't found something doesn't mean it doesn't exist.

Indeed, these protobut not only existed, they'd already been examined and blown off. Friedman found the benchmark fossils in the basement of the Natural History Museum in Vienna, and that fact is, in itself, indicative of a subtler but in some ways more important philosophical victory by the epistemological traditions of science over I.D.

I.D. is, in itself, uncurious. It forms an end to inquiry, an end to searching. It provides little motivation to rifle through stacks of dusty rocks in Austria, because what's your journal article going to be, "Fossil finds confirm the continued non-deadness of God"? For all its inherent undertones of Eternity (a perk of the whole God job), it ends up being the nontheistic traditions of science that sketch out a neverending road of inquiry, an edifice constantly being built. It affirms the idea that pleasure can be found in process of drawing the world, one rock at the time.

Whereas the supposed superiority of I.D. comes from its ability to answer everything, in total, right now, so everyone can go about the more important things like inheriting various winds or some shit like that.

{from Nature (the magazine) News, and dramatized in Lunar Weight's debut production, "Inherit the Wino," showing every third Tuesday afternoon at the New Jersey Turnpike's very own Vince Lombardi Rest Area}

Sans Booze, Death Doesn't Seem So Bad

The irony of crying in your beer is, when there's no beer, there's more crying. So say UNC Chapel Hill researchers, who linked cessation of drinking—even moderated, "healthy" levels of drinking—to mid-term depression.

Well, sort of. In fact, what they found is that enforced sobriety makes mice welcome death.

They found this by making mice drunk, then miserable. If you haven't figured out how to go about the former, then you're probably going to heaven but arriving very bored. The latter, however, is a bit trickier, since you can't just mock their love for Tokio Hotel, or take away their Wii, or confound them with evil proto-Roombas.

Instead, scientists used what's known as the Porsolt swim test. In brief, this involves dropping mice into an escape-proof, water-filled vessel and making them ratty-paddle around for a while, then taking them out. Then doing it again. How depressed the mice are is measured by how well they handle the, "Oh my fucking god not again why me!" factor.

A well-adjusted mouse will keep swimming for it. A depressed mouse will just bob there for a while before reluctantly making an effort.

The mice still boozing it were happy to swim in the hopes of seeing another day and another mojito, maybe catching a band later (though they never do get around to swinging through Cat's Cradle...).

The mice hung out to dry—um, so to speak—realized they were stuck in Chapel Hill ("...the southern part of heaven!" ) with nothing to drink, and decided maybe drowning wasn't such a bad option after all.

{from the UNC News website, through a simply delightful hangover}