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• Commented on Conscious "coma man"'s words seemingly delivered via discredited "facilitated communications" technique
  Did you, in fact, just make an argument from hypothetical anecdote? Srsly? If FC wants to be more than a ouija board with a special needs kid attached, all it has to do is perform reasonably above chance on any...
• Commented on Runaway Lets Subway Do the Running For Him
  @Anonymous #3: Sounds like a sharp kid, if lacking a bit in sense of proportion....
• Commented on Galileo's fingers found
  @Adam: I'm guessing that if the buddha had an eyelash for every temple built around one of the buddha's eyelashes, he would have been a werewolf. A very serene werewolf....
• Commented on Much loved photo supply store B&H sued for job discrimination against women
  The Photo Forum seems disconcertingly fixated on what those uppity broads will do to their god-given everyday low prices......
• Commented on Hugo Chavez, cannibalism apologist
  I just don't understand how people can use "nationalist" and "patriot" as compliments....
• Commented on A programmer's lament on the Apple App Store
  Jailbreaking isn't getting any easier, and Apple holds all the cards in the long term. Just ask several million Xbox360 owners how trying to fight the man on his own terms works out for you....
• Commented on Glowing bacteria that finds landmines
  The knowledge that the default demining mechanism is little ragged children with big eyes does put most other options in perspective....
• Commented on Glowing bacteria that finds landmines
  On decent mines, virtually no metal. With a plastic case and a chemical/mechanical detonator, you can avoid nearly all metal parts....
• Commented on Seth Godin rants on faux science and irrationality
  Hunches can be(and often are, for the set of situations that we've evolved for) accurate, even more accurate than attempts at rational cogitation. Just imagine trying to catch a baseball using your knowledge of physics and calculating in your head....
• Commented on Glowing bacteria that finds landmines
  It'd work in the short term; but I suspect that that wouldn't be terribly relevant. In the short term(i.e. while hostilities are actively ongoing in the area) you try to avoid having sappers grovelling around finding mines one at a...
• Commented on Trompe l'oeil back-garden sink-hole
  Ah, but that is the real genius of the design! By making the hole so small, the designer has forced the user to cut down the tree and sequester the evil wicked carbon it contains every few years....
• Commented on Glowing bacteria that finds landmines
  Per photon, the human eye is most sensitive to green light. When dealing with photo-luminescent bacteria, you probably don't get huge amounts of light, so efficiency counts. Plus GFP is all kinds of convenient. Since color doesn't matter, just luminous...
• Commented on Hamster Hotel lets you live like a rodent
  There is no escape from the hotel of the furries......
• Commented on First photo of baby coelacanth
  The researches then decided to experimentally determine what coelacanths taste like when still moving......
• Commented on Outrage grows over India's massive ID plan
  Even if that were a good idea, how could one possibly trust the motives of anybody who would try to pull it off secretly?...
• Commented on Mac|Life imagines Apple products of the future
  I'm afraid that the iRead would only be a plausible future Apple product if Steve Jobs were to die in the meantime. Look at this picture. See the consumer accessible expansion slot poking crudely through the smooth, fingerprint-magnet perfection(complete with...
• Commented on Upscale horseback riding school was CIA torture site
  Yeah, but its 45,000 poor Americans every year. That really takes the pain away....
• Commented on "Don't Poke Scalia"
  Wow, just more evidence that Scalia is a prick....
• Commented on Demonstrating TSA futility by stabbing dead pigs with pens
  "Use of a Australian academic model to demonstrate vulnerability of uppity Australian academics to inflicted inconvenience from common legal harassment strategies" Hugs and Kisses -TSA...
• Commented on Hippos don't like croocdiles climbing over their backs
  I'm glad that the article was careful to draw the distinction that the hippo is only the most dangerous wild animal in Africa....
• Commented on Police officer tasers a 10-year-girl who resisted being taken to a youth center
  Sure; but you aren't going to like their methods......
• Commented on Placenta fluid massage to treat soccer player's injury
  While it is highly likely that this "therapy" is either entirely unvalidated, or validated in only the shoddiest of manners, as seems to be the custom; it isn't utterly without theoretical biological basis(unlike, say, homeopathy or energy healing). Aside from...
• Commented on UN goons destroy academic poster describing China's censorwall
  The trouble with the UN is that it is a quasi-representative body in a world where most governments are better left unrepresented. Their ostensible commitment to human rights is distinctly secondary. Let's see, this is(to my knowledge) the second time...
• Commented on Secret Diary of a Specialist in Developmental Neurotoxicology and Cancer Epidemiology
  I would fairly strongly suspect(though I'd like to see some hard numbers one way or the other) that the risks of prostitution vary pretty markedly between the various economic strata in the business....
• Commented on An evening of confusion with Dell customer service
  I can't say that I've ever had a particularly bad experience with Dell(though, since most of my interactions with them are on behalf of a school district that buys Dells by the pallet load, this isn't a huge surprise, Dell...
• Commented on Duke University official concerned that sex toy study will make students want to "just sit around and masturbate"
  To quote the good Stephen Fry: "The only people who are obsessed with food are anorexics and the morbidly obese. And that, in erotic terms, is the Catholic church in a nutshell."...
• Commented on Is Sony legally required to make its games accessible to disabled people?
  Landsburg doesn't seem to have encountered the notion that scale matters. The "Mary/apartment" example is all well and good in theory; but the phrase "sundown town" pretty much encapsulates how well it tends to turn out in practice......
• Commented on Digging in to the donor details at Kiva.org
  It would be interesting to know what, exactly, is upsetting those who are upset. Is it a feeling that they've been lied to? Or is it the concern that the big faceless aid organization isn't necessarily allocating the resources that...
• Commented on Venezuela bans violent video games: a first-person guest essay
  @anon #1: Obviously, the correlation between violence and videogames is pitiful, and this move is all about Chavez's crazy grandstanding. However, your "Why cant people just understand some people just arent right in the head?" represents a particularly useless flavor...
• Commented on Videos of exploding capacitors
  I hope, when he went for older electrolytics to get the ones without the pre-scored vent points, that he didn't get any that were too old. Modern electrolyte formulations may or may not be especially good for you; but older...