You wouldn’t want to take a bath in 70°C water. That would be painful. That’s the temperature of the Grand Prismatic Spring in Yellowstone. We had a dramatic demonstration of how awful …

Free Thought Blogs Pharyngula

26.06.2025

I done gone did it again

I was doing so well this summer! Regular light exercise, joints working smoothly, no aches or pains…and then last night, something went bad in my right knee, with no warning, no sudden snap, nothin…

Free Thought Blogs Pharyngula

25.06.2025

Truth Social is nothing but self-serving lies

Late last night, I got an alert with the good news that Iran and Israel were going to stop shooting missiles at each other. US president Donald Trump has announced in a social media post that Iran …

Free Thought Blogs Pharyngula

25.06.2025

Learning a bit about neurodivergence

A person named Elise has compiled a spreadsheet of responses from neurodivergent people about their jobs and careers. I learned something from browsing through it. Most of the respondents seen to f…

Free Thought Blogs Pharyngula

24.06.2025

This cartoon is entirely false

You can ask my wife what it’s like being married to a biologist, and she’ll tell you. There is zero roadkill in our house. I like my captured organisms alive and breeding.

Free Thought Blogs Pharyngula

24.06.2025

So much effort spiraling down the drain of AI

Google has come up with a new tool for generating video called Veo — feed it some detailed prompts, and it will spit back realistic video and audio. David Gerard and Aron Peterson decided to …

Free Thought Blogs Pharyngula

24.06.2025

Put yourself in their shoes

There may be little point to these comments, because the people who need to hear them most are incapable of empathy. Our bombing of Iran was a surprise attack, and the initial missiles flung at the…

Free Thought Blogs Pharyngula

24.06.2025

“our nation’s reputation abroad is plummeting”

The World Humanist Conference was scheduled for next year in Washington DC. I’ve been to this conference in Oxford in the past — it’s a good meeting, and I would have planned on a…

Free Thought Blogs Pharyngula

23.06.2025

Found a bee

It happened to be right there as I walked into the house. It’s too hot to go looking for them.

Free Thought Blogs Pharyngula

23.06.2025

America is a zombie nation infected with the rage virus

Two days ago, Donald Trump was whining that he wasn’t going to win a Nobel Peace Prize, despite the fact that he had been so great at negotiating peace in the world. He really, really wants a…

Free Thought Blogs Pharyngula

22.06.2025

A proud ally of Morris Pride

I walked to the Morris Pride celebration at Eastside Park this afternoon, wearing my Biology is Bigger than Binaries t-shirt. I’m not wearing it now, because as soon as I got home I stripped …

Free Thought Blogs Pharyngula

22.06.2025

Microbial evolution…in spaaaace!

China has a space station named Tiangong that we don’t hear much about in US media, which is a shame. The station was launched in part because “Congress passed a law prohibiting NASA fr…

Free Thought Blogs Pharyngula

22.06.2025

Celebrate today!

We’re having a Pride celebration here in little ol’ Morris, Minnesota this afternoon, 2-5pm at Eastside Park. I might stroll by this afternoon.

Free Thought Blogs Pharyngula

21.06.2025

When will we get a vaccine against Billionaire Brain Disease?

Would anyone be surprised by this observation? Wealth and privilege mess up your head. In 2011, a Berkeley grad student named Paul Piff conducted an experiment that has since become famous in the w…

Free Thought Blogs Pharyngula

20.06.2025

Boom, again

The bad news: another SpaceX Starship exploded spectactularly. The good news: it blew up on the ground, so it’s not raining fiery debris down on the Caribbean. Other good news: that’s E…

Free Thought Blogs Pharyngula

20.06.2025

My purpose in life

I have been enlightened. I know exactly what my role on this Earth is. Yesterday, my wife found a dead rabbit in the shrubbery in our yard. You couldn’t miss it — the odor was horrific.…

Free Thought Blogs Pharyngula

20.06.2025

Not in the market right now, but I’d consider it

I drive a 2011 Honda Fit. It’s an ultra-reliable car, running without a hitch for 14 years now, not even a hiccup. The labels on some of the buttons on the dashboard are wearing off, but that…

Free Thought Blogs Pharyngula

19.06.2025

The army is fast-tracking corruption right into the officer corps

I have a son who is a major in the army — he worked his way up in the ranks, and he’s hoping to earn a promotion to lieutenant colonel sometime before he retires, but it gets harder and…

Free Thought Blogs Pharyngula

19.06.2025

People are irrational by nature

I’m trying hard to make videos as a regular habit, just to get back in the swing of things. In this one, I’m just monologuing about social justice and atheism. Transcript below the fold…

Free Thought Blogs Pharyngula

19.06.2025

Jurassic spider tracks!

You need to include a scale with these images, Riley Black! I need to know how many tons a Jurassic spider weighed.

Free Thought Blogs Pharyngula

19.06.2025

Run, if you see this in a car

Vance Boelter is cooked. You can see a detailed list of all the evidence he left in his wake, as he fled, and it’s overwhelming. This is going to be a short trial. I was horrified at the glim…

Free Thought Blogs Pharyngula

19.06.2025

I can’t believe I’m suddenly pro-Iran

I don’t like theocracies, and it doesn’t matter whether they’re the Islamic Iranian kind or the Christian American kind, but Iran has a right to exist, and they are the victims of…

Free Thought Blogs Pharyngula

19.06.2025

Minnesota has lost a thriving business

Are you in the market for a pillow? You could go to MyPillow.com and order one, along with lots of cheap Chinese-made products. Not for much longer, though. He has been tried for defamation for the…

Free Thought Blogs Pharyngula

18.06.2025

I recognize that specific racist Uncle Sam!

Back in the 1980s, we made frequent family trips from Eugene to Seattle and back again, and one of the major landmarks was this huge billboard just off I-5 that always featured these demented, raci…

Free Thought Blogs Pharyngula

18.06.2025

You may want to avoid produce from Texas

I wonder what RFK Jr and the MAHA gang think of this: This topic is all coming to a head right now because the great state of Texas has just passed legislation that allows recycled fracking wastewa…

Free Thought Blogs Pharyngula

18.06.2025

Women’s bodies must be hidden!

The transphobes are experiencing the contradictions inherent in their ideas. In England, which has become Transphobe Central, they set up some rules that competitors in swimming competitions must c…

Free Thought Blogs Pharyngula

17.06.2025

Creep

RJ May, a state representative in South Carolina, voted for anti-trans legislation, and then piously declared that We as legislators have an obligation to insure that our children have no harm done…

Free Thought Blogs Pharyngula

17.06.2025

Are you unmarried? Are you a Democrat?

You could be in trouble. Those rules that target trans people could be used against you. VA officials cite the president’s 30 January executive order titled Defending Women from Gender Ideology Ext…

Free Thought Blogs Pharyngula

17.06.2025

A famous hoax

Hey! I vividly remember this cover, the May 1969 issue of Argosy magazine! My father’s family was fond of some of these weird men’s magazines of that time, which often featured macho ma…

Free Thought Blogs Pharyngula

17.06.2025

I’m sorry, we’re going to have to ban tea now

People use tea for tasseography, or tea leaf reading, which is silly, stupid, and wrong, so we have to stomp this vile practice down hard. Big Tea has had its claws in us for too long, and now they…

Free Thought Blogs Pharyngula

17.06.2025

They caught him!

The police caught Vance Boelter. Good. Now we can all forget him forever. Except for the people whose lives he harmed. Two of them are dead, two were incredibly lucky. On Sunday evening, US Senator…

Free Thought Blogs Pharyngula

16.06.2025

Manhunt!

The pursuit of Vance Boelter, the assassin of Melissa Hortman, continues. The rats are scattering. His wife, Jenny Lynn Boelter, was stopped in Onamia, a town well north of Minneapolis. She was not…

Free Thought Blogs Pharyngula

16.06.2025

We know how to really hurt Donald Trump

Tell him that he had a tiny crowd size at his expensive parade. For an event that shut down much of central Washington D.C., closed key roads, and reportedly cost up to $45 million, the promise of …

Free Thought Blogs Pharyngula

15.06.2025

The Morris “No Kings” protest march

I recorded the whole thing. You can take a little tour of downtown Morris, Minnesota right here.

Free Thought Blogs Pharyngula

15.06.2025

Time to protest

I’m getting ready to leave the house and join the No Kings protest here in Morris, Minnesota. I read up on recommendations made for other protests — stuff like leave your phone at home,…

Free Thought Blogs Pharyngula

15.06.2025

A dismal way to start the march

We were just beginning to gather the group for our protest march, when we listened to Governor Walz’s announcement about the murders last night. Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension Supe…

Free Thought Blogs Pharyngula

14.06.2025

Tomorrow is another podcast day

After a busy day protesting the fascist takeover of our country, sit back and listen to the FtB gang discuss their experiences with Large Language Models.

Free Thought Blogs Pharyngula

14.06.2025

They’re not geniuses — they’re pretentious twits

I rather strongly dislike Chris Hedges, but I have to admit that sometimes he makes a good point. The last days of dying empires are dominated by idiots. The Roman, Mayan, French, Habsburg, Ottoman…

Free Thought Blogs Pharyngula

14.06.2025

Gray days

It’s been raining non-stop for the last few days, just an ongoing drizzle, cool and wet. No spiders. Spiders are not fans of the excessive water falling out of the sky. I’m missing my l…

Free Thought Blogs Pharyngula

13.06.2025

Don’t use these posters

Are you ready for the big No Kings protest on Saturday? Are you making signs? I have to tell you that you shouldn’t use these as ideas for posters. Those are sarcasm. Sarcasm doesn’t wo…

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Free Thought Blogs Pharyngula - Science

Lobsters, OK — but please don’t boil the bison

I done gone did it again

Truth Social is nothing but self-serving lies

Learning a bit about neurodivergence

This cartoon is entirely false

So much effort spiraling down the drain of AI

Put yourself in their shoes

“our nation’s reputation abroad is plummeting”

Found a bee

America is a zombie nation infected with the rage virus

A proud ally of Morris Pride

Microbial evolution…in spaaaace!

Celebrate today!

When will we get a vaccine against Billionaire Brain Disease?

Boom, again

My purpose in life

Not in the market right now, but I’d consider it

The army is fast-tracking corruption right into the officer corps

People are irrational by nature

Jurassic spider tracks!

Run, if you see this in a car

I can’t believe I’m suddenly pro-Iran

Minnesota has lost a thriving business

I recognize that specific racist Uncle Sam!

You may want to avoid produce from Texas

Women’s bodies must be hidden!

Creep

Are you unmarried? Are you a Democrat?

A famous hoax

I’m sorry, we’re going to have to ban tea now

They caught him!

Manhunt!

We know how to really hurt Donald Trump

The Morris “No Kings” protest march

Time to protest

A dismal way to start the march

Tomorrow is another podcast day

They’re not geniuses — they’re pretentious twits

Gray days

Don’t use these posters

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