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Music of the Spheres

It has been a complicated year here on Earth, and it would be a pity to end on a down note. So take a look at a cool bit of video provided by the Hubble Space Telescope. (If the video...

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December 31, 2008 | Permalink | User Comments (3)

‘Green’ Bible Stirs Controversy Among Evangelicals

ABC News' Ki Mae Heussner reports: The Bible has gone green. But some in the evangelical community object to spreading the “good news” through an eco-friendly Good Book. Released by HarperCollins Publishers this fall, the Green Bible emphasizes environmental messages...

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December 31, 2008 | Permalink | User Comments (230)

Don't Touch That Dial

It's been called the biggest shift in television service since color, but it's really more than that. When color TV began, people, at least, could still watch their old black-and-white sets. When broadcast television switches to digital transmission on February...

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December 29, 2008 | Permalink | User Comments (109)

Quickly, Before We Leave....

Every administration, on its way out the door, leaves with a flurry of actions that it couldn't do before, or wouldn't do because of the likely backlash. Remember Bill Clinton's pardon of the financier Marc Rich? Jimmy Carter's White House...

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December 12, 2008 | Permalink | User Comments (50)

Star Wars

Barack Obama does not need any headaches from Michael Griffin. He has enough because of the economy and Rod Blagojevich. But Griffin, the head of NASA, has made it apparent that (1) he'd like to stay on the job, and...

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December 11, 2008 | Permalink | User Comments (22)

Zeitgeist

It's only December 10, but not too soon for some of the year-end lists that that many of us will pore over as we hope for a better year next year. Today Google is out with its "Year-End Google Zeitgeist"...

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December 10, 2008 | Permalink | User Comments (4)

Leap Second

...and you only thought this year was dragging on forever? Turns out it really is, by a little bit. The U.S. Naval Observatory has let it be known that one extra second will be added to 2008, right at the...

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December 8, 2008 | Permalink | User Comments (37)

Clean Body, Clean Mind?

Columnist Lee Dye reports: Maybe what the world really needs is a hot, sudsy bath. Researchers in Great Britain have found that even just washing your hands may make you less harsh in your judgment of others. Their study, published...

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December 5, 2008 | Permalink | User Comments (20)

"Interstellar Interloper"

David G. Schleicher of the Lowell Observatory in Arizona has been watching a comet called 96P/Machholz 1, and he thinks he's on to something. Its chemistry is odd. It has only about one percent as much of the compound cyanogen...

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December 3, 2008 | Permalink | User Comments (9)

Millions and Millions

This is one of those cases in which a picture is worth a thousand words -- or perhaps 186, which is what I've written below. The picture is of Omega Centauri, a globular cluster (or perhaps dwarf galaxy) in the...

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December 2, 2008 | Permalink | User Comments (16)