Miniblog

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  Want to break into the White House?
  

  Apparently all you need are a photocopier, spare credit card and a paperclip. Security researchers at the Defcon hacker conference in Las Vegas demonstrated Friday Friday how to easily duplicate the keys to Medeco "high security" locks. Medeco's locks protect the White House, Pentagon, embasies and other sensitive locations. Marc Weber Tobias, one of the researchers, said, "Virtually all conventional pin-tumbler locks are vulnerable to this method of attack, and frankly nobody has really considered it or looked at it before."

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  Amtrak can't handle increasing ridership
  

  It's what could be considered a best of times, worst of times scenario for Amtrak. Rising fuel costs mean that Amtrak ridership is steadily increasing. Yet Amtrak can't keep up after decades of slashed budgets and neglect. Actually, it sounds downright dismal if Amtrak doesn't get needed funding. According to Amtrak CEO Alex Kummaut, it'll take upwards of a decade and $3 billion to replace Amtrak's current rolling stock, including the 20 Acela trains. Yet later on in the article he dismisses out of hand the idea of creating high speed rail. Depressing.

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  About perchlorate on Mars
  

  A teleconference was held today at JPL to discuss the recent intermediate findings by the Phoenix Mars Lander's science team of perchlorate on Mars. JPL has posted the MP3 audio of the telecon, and you can find the referenced images here. You can also subscribe to JPL's podcast feed to keep up-to-date on the science as it evolves. What does it all mean though? Well, not much. The science team seems pretty confident the perchlorate wasn't from contamination of Phoenix's instruments by the third stage rocket booster, but it's still an intermediate result and needs to be confirmed. Perchlorate doesn't mean Mars couldn't support life, but it would be different from the way everyone was looking at it before. For instance, in the Atacama desert of chile, organic matter and microorganisms coexist with perchlorate.

  For more about the Phoenix Mars Lander, please read our exclusive interview with Phoenix (Part 1 and Part II).

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  Free membership to the American Humanist Association
  

  This is very cool. The American Humanist Association is offering a free on-line membership. Just go here and select "Free Trial! Online-Only Membership" from the drop-down menu, click "Add to Cart" and complete the checkout process. While you don't get all the benefits of belonging to the AHA, you do get "exclusive access to the Humanist Online and Free Mind Online (coming soon), in addition to up-to-the-minute news on AHA activities and programs." Oh, and you can help swell the ranks of one of the finest secular organizations out there as well as being able to proudly tell everyone that you belong to a national Humanist association. Thanks to Friendly Atheist and Skeptigator for the tip.

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  Phil Plait new president of JREF
  

  For anyone who might have missed it, James Randi announced that the "Bad Astronomer" Phil Pait will be the new president of the James Randi Educational Foundation. This is really exciting news as we all wondered who Randi would pass the torch to. I can't think of a better person for the job than Phil. Congratulations guy!

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  Carnival of Space #65
  

  Get your fill of space related blogging with the latest Carnival of Space at 21st Century Waves.

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  92nd Skeptics' Circle
  

  The latest meeting of skeptic bloggers is taking place over at The Lay Scientist's pad. Another round-up of some of the best skeptical writing on these here intertubes.

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  New wave of creationism in Europe
  

  One of the reasons, I think, that it’s important to read and understand science, even if one isn’t a scientist, is because how we understand our world has implications for the kind of society we live in. An article in the May/June 2008 New Humanist talks about how a fundamental ignorance of evolution has led to a rise in creationist beliefs in Europe, including a disturbing new phenomenom — Muslim creationism.

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  About time... and our brains.
  

  The way our brains evolved means we’re not naturally very good scientists, nevertheless science continues to inform our understanding of our minds. Carl Zimmer has a particulary interesting article talking about the three ways our brains affect our perception of the passage of time.

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  Once again, the plural of anecdote isn't data
  

  Most skeptics know that determining whether or not our knowledge accurately reflects the real world is problematic at best. While the scientific method is often considered the best tool we have for understanding how the world works, our brains tend to place more value on anecdotal evidence. Michael Shermer explains How Anecdotal Evidence Can Undermine Scientific Results.