What's New Friday July 6, 2008

WHAT’S NEW   Robert L. Park   Friday, 6 Jun 08   Washington, DC

1.  ENERGY: $4 GAS SEEMS TO BE THE TIPPING POINT. 
The nation has suddenly become energy conscious, forcing GM to slash 
production of SUVs and dump the Hummer.  Why, you may wonder, did it take 
so long?  Meanwhile, old energy scams are blossoming again.  This week, a 
reader pointed out, a new web site that sells instructions ($49.95) for 
converting your car to run on tap water www.runyourscarwithwater.com.  It 
uses the car battery to split water into hydrogen and oxygen.  Are these 
the same people who sold George W. Bush on the hydrogen car in 2003?   
Predictably, the focus on energy has even brought cold fusion back, with 
physicist Yoshiaki Arata at Osaka University claiming to have the 
first "real" demonstration of the 1989 Pons and Fleischmann fizzle.  Even 
the hydrino is back.

2. HYDRINOS: HOW LONG CAN A REALLY DUMB IDEA SURVIVE? 
BlackLight Power (BLP), founded 17 years ago as HydroCatalysis, announced 
last week that the company had successfully tested a prototype power 
system that would generate 50 KW of thermal power.  BLP anticipates 
delivery of the new power system in 12 to 18 months.  The BLP process, 
http://bobpark.physics.umd.edu/WN91/wn042691.html , discovered by Randy 
Mills, is said to coax hydrogen atoms into a "state below the ground 
state," called the "hydrino."  There is no independent scientific 
confirmation of the hydrino, and BLP has a patent problem.  So they have 
nothing to sell but bull shit. The company is therefore dependent on 
investors with deep pockets and shallow brains.

3.  CREATIONISM IN TEXAS: ITS STRENGTHS AND WEAKNESSES.
Texas is a huge textbook market with a major influence on content.  
Republican Governor Rick Perry, and Don McLeroy, a dentist who chairs the 
State Board of Education, are both creationists.  So are 7 of the 15 board 
members.  And this summer the board will determine the curriculum for the 
next decade.   Curriculum standards call for teaching the "strengths and 
weaknesses" of evolution.  The "weaknesses" seen by the creationists are 
religious objections.   The New York Times quotes McLeroy as saying, "that 
little baby born in the manger was the god that created the universe."

4.  CELL PHONES: DANGEROUS EXPOSURE TO LARRY KING.
A grieving widower told Larry King his wife "held it against her head and 
talked all the time," http://bobpark.physics.umd.edu/WN93/wn012993.html .  
That interview set off the great cell phone panic.  Now, 15 years later, 
Dr. King interviewed three neurosurgeons who said they don’t hold cell 
phones against their heads.  Can microwaves be the cause of mutant strands 
of DNA?  Dr. King didn’t ask, and the neurosurgeons probably didn’t know.  
The answer: http://jnci.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/extract/93/3/166 .  

5.  HUNGER: THE SOLUTION IS NOT SHAMBAS IN AMERICA.
In the name of land reform, many of the most productive agricultural 
regions of Africa have been divided into tiny farm plots called shambas.  
Because of high birth rates, a shamba is hard put to support a single 
family.  With the best of intentions, 27 immigrant families from Africa 
are now being relocated on small plots in Vermont.

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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