The always fascinating travel website Atlas Obscura is devoted to exploring the weirder nooks and crannies of the planet, and last week they announced a big festival for this summer’s upcoming total solar eclipse. It’s happening in Eastern Oregon in the path of totality (i.e., a concentrated geographic band where the viewpoint from Earth will […]
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Should the Fast & Furious Family Go to Outer Space? A Point/Counterpoint On the Most Urgent Issue of Our Time
PhotoShop: Nick Olmstead. Background: Adam Block/Mount Lemmon SkyCenter/University of Arizona. Fast Fam: Universal. POINT: YES, THE FAST & FURIOUS FAMILY SHOULD GO TO OUTER SPACEby Erik Henriksen Before we look to the future, we must look to the past. Remember the olden days. In the olden days (2001), it was enough for a gang of […]
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Give a Shit About Science, Progress, and Equality? Then Don’t Miss the March for Science
In a mere three months, Donald Trump—who lost the popular vote by 2,864,974 votes—has fucked up a bunch of shit. But the most terrifying of those fuck-ups have been his administration’s brutally ignorant attacks on science. Take Trump’s cabinet appointments—which included making an ExxonMobil oil profiteer Secretary of State, and giving the Environmental Protection Agency […]
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Since We Won’t be Teaching Science in School Anymore, Bill Nye is Here to Save the World
Children of the ’90s commence freak out. Bill Nye is returning to television, and the first trailer for “Bill Nye Saves the World” is out today! From Netflix: Bill Nye hosts a talk show exploring scientific issues from space exploration to fad diets. Guests join for lab demos and myth busting. The show is scheduled […]
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As Snow Approaches, PBOT’s Buying Road Salt… And Maybe Drones
Saltzman, talking saltz. (I don’t care what you say.) Dirk VanderHart Here come the rain drones. As Portland braces for what might be inches of snow and accompanying freezing rain in the next few days, city officials this afternoon rolled out a number of new steps they’re prepared to take to ensure the city isn’t […]
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The Women’s March on Portland is Massive, Jubilant, and Lit
It’s hard to think some record isn’t being broken today, as tens of thousands of people have converged in a crush of wet, jubilant, Trump-hating humanity in McCall Waterfront Park for the Women’s March on Portland. As we write this, the massive demonstration is still singing, chanting, and cursing its way through the streets of […]
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Hope You Like Being Cold!
It’s sunny and 28 degrees this morning. A full two days after what by all accounts was a pretty mild snowfall, Portland’s roads and sidewalks are still in pretty horrible shape. Our current unusually low temperatures haven’t ventured much above freezing since Wednesday’s snowfall, and what has melted so far has refrozen into slick ice […]
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Science News: CO2 Levels Clear Frightening Threshold. So Even if Trump Loses, We’re Still Fucked
Earth looking a little like Solaris on September 27, 2016. NASA Global Mean Atmospheric CO2 Levels Clear 400ppm, Forever: The average concentration of carbon dioxide in our atmosphere fluctuates annually, dropping during the northern hemisphere’s spring and summer and rising in the fall and winter. This pattern is a product of what ecologists refer to […]
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Neil deGrasse Tyson Talks Ignorance, Dragons, Ibsen, and Ben DeLaCreme. You Know, the Usual.
Neil deGrasse Tyson will appear in Portland Tue-Wed Sept 19-20. He is good.
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Pack Your Bags, There’s a New Planet For Us to Ruin!
I’m going to put my couch over by that rock, okay? ESO/M. Kornmesser Everyone: We may have an out. A group of scientists have confirmed to the journal Nature the existence of a new-to-you planet orbiting Proxima Centauri, our closest neighbor star, It’s likely terrestrial—i.e. it’s made of rock—and probably has an atmosphere that is […]
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Contrary to Bullseye Glass’s Claims, a New State Report Suggests the Company’s Been Releasing Harmful Chromium
Michelle Mitchell THE BAD NEWS, according to the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ): melt the relatively benign metal trivalent chromium (Cr III) in a glass furnace, and 98.4 percent of what’s not captured in the glass emerges as a fierce carcinogen, hexavalent chromium (Cr VI or hex-chrome). The worse news: a properly functioning baghouse […]
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Science News: Trump’s VP Pick Mike Pence Is Bad on Global Warming and Evolution, Our Oceans Need the Volume Turned Down
“Give me a minute to think about this. I was not made by a giant kitty but a supernatural ape.” yykkaa/shutterstock.com Trump’s Reported VP Pick Predictably Poor on Global Warming, Evolution: The Washington Post has the details. But essentially, Mike Pence, the governor of Indiana, is “not a big believer in man-made climate change.” Meaning, […]