Maybe it’s just cause I recently finished Lucifer’s Hammer

But all I could think about when I watched the video below was (H/T Instapundit), “I’m glad that hit the sun and not the earth, or else that’d be all she wrote.”

A comet strike would be the very definition of a mass extinction event.

It’s not a question of if, but of when; if we want to be “safe” from comet/asteroid strikes, we’ve got to get off this ball of dirt and expand, first in-system, and eventually beyond.

In the long run, we might all be dead, but there’s no reason not to put that off as long as possible.

Tapha Niang

When LittleBigPlanet was released, it was delayed for a few days because of controversy surrounding the lyrics in one of the songs.

This is that song.

It plays during the Swinging Safari level, and the lyrics feature passages from the Koran. One person noticed this and notified Sony, saying that it could be offensive to Muslims. This prompted a recall and patching for those who didn’t comply with the recall, and the lyrics were removed from the song, making it instrumental only.

It’s a pretty catchy song, and I don’t particularly care that I don’t understand the lyrics, or that some of them reference the Koran. I do think it was a bit ridiculous for Sony to cave in to theoretical Muslim pressure; wikipedia says that no complaints were actually received.

Oh Noes! I’m not a part of the media elite, so I’m unqualified to share my opinions!

According to Aaron Sorkin, who says:

When I read the Times or The Wall Street Journal, I know those reporters had to have cleared a very high bar to get the jobs they have. When I read a blog piece from “BobsThoughts.com,” Bob could be the most qualified guy in the world but I have no way of knowing that because all he had to do to get his job was set up a website–something my 10-year-old daughter has been doing for 3 years. When The Times or The Journal get it wrong they have a lot of people to answer to. When Bob gets it wrong there are no immediate consequences for Bob except his wrong information is in the water supply now so there are consequences for us…

I don’t claim to be an expert on anything, but I’m fairly sure that I know more than most journalists about chemical engineering and Japanese culture.

How can I be sure, you ask?

Because I read the damn articles journalists write, and they’re badly researched, badly written, and get stuff wrong.

Why should I expect journalists to be any more right about anything else they write about? Should I just assume they know what they’re talking about with respect to the economy, or to medicine, or physics, or law, or any other subject?