What's New Friday January 13, 2006

WHAT'S NEW   Robert L. Park   Friday, 13 Jan 06   Washington, DC

1. OIL: ONE WAY OR THE OTHER, ALASKAN WILDLIFE PAYS THE PRICE. 
Congress said no to ANWAR, not much is flowing out of Iraq, and
we're not doing business with Iran.  The solution is to open up
389,000 acres in Alaska that had been off-limits to energy
development.  This time it's migratory birds that will suffer. 
But energy problems are great for zero-point energy scams.

2. BLACKLIGHT POWER: SOME IDEAS ARE SIMPLY TOO DUMB TO DIE! 
Since 1991, http://bobpark.physics.umd.edu/WN91/wn042691.html ,
WN has followed the strange case of the "hydrino," tiny hydrogen
atoms in a "state below the ground state," according to Randell
Mills, M.D., author of The Grand Unified Theory of Classical
Quantum Mechanics.  We haven't heard much about Mills and his
company, BlackLight Power, since they lost a patent appeal three 
years ago http://bobpark.physics.umd.edu/WN02/wn090602.html . But
with the start of the new year, Dow Jones Newswires ran a story
about deep-pocket financial gurus that are backing BlackLight.  A
retired head of energy banking at Morgan Stanley commented that
physicists are "hostile" to Mills ideas.  Bob Park, was the only
physicist quoted.  Sure enough, he was hostile.  "Park represents
an entrenched physics establishment that fears losing billions in
funding and having its work discredited,"  Mills explained.

3. CREATIONISM: KITZMILLER V. DOVER SCHOOL BOARD DIDN'T END IT. 
Who thought it would?  In Dover, the issue was that intelligent
design was misrepresented as science.  So why not misrepresent it
as something else?  In Lebec, CA, a course on the Origins of Life
is listed as Philosophy, but it's still intelligent design.  The
Calvary Chapel Christian School in Murrieta, CA is suing the
University of California for not giving credit for courses with a
"Christian viewpoint."  At Calvary Chapel, that's everything but
mathematics.  In Ohio, they don't bother to disguise it.  The
Board of Education voted to keep a controversial biology lesson,
Critical Analysis of Evolution, that tells students to examine
"alternate theories of evolution."  Lamarckian perhaps?  In a
fundraising letter, Discovery Institute founder Phillip Johnson
dropped all pretense, "our ultimate goal is to affirm God and
defeat Darwinism...to shape public policy in accordance with
conservative Christian philosophy and get it into our schools."

4. SCIENCE ADVISORY PANELS: POLITICAL LITMUS TESTS ARE OUTLAWED. 
The NIH funding bill, signed into law on 30 Dec 05, contains a
measure inserted by Richard Durbin (D-IL) to prevent political
interference in scientific decisions.  There are some 1,000
federal advisory panels that examine science issues, such as safe
drinking water standards.  In 2004, the National Academy of
Sciences had found that nominees to these panels were often
questioned about their political affiliations and voting history.
The new law makes it illegal to ask such questions of nominees,
however, it provides no penalties if the ban is violated.

THE UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND.
Opinions are the author's and not necessarily shared by the
University of Maryland, but they should be.
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