WUWT -How deeply have you considered the social life of spiders? Are they social animals or solitary animals? Do they work together? Do they form social networks? Does their behavior change as in “adaptive evolution of individual differences in behavior”?
In yet another blow to the sanctity of peer-reviewed science and a simultaneous win for personal integrity and self-correcting nature of science, there is an ongoing tsunami of retractions in a field of study of which most of us have never even heard.
Science magazine online covers part of the story in “Spider biologist denies suspicions of widespread data fraud in his animal personality research.”
“Publish or perish” is strong motivation to lie about everything under and including the sun. Government grants will redouble that motivation.
Are you telling me that this groundbreaking study of spiders on drugs may not be valid???
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sHzdsFiBbFc
🙂
gotta be careful about them ‘spider studies’ …
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=88&v=sHzdsFiBbFc&feature=emb_logo
& that’s why, thanks to gov’t, you can no longer rely on ‘science’
I squash every spider I see. Have never considered socializing with them. I try that next time. Before I kill him.
Hey, spiders are just trying to make a living, you know?
Some have even told me they’d vote for Trump if they had the chance.
So, don’t squish spiders – unless they’re Brown Recluses or Black Widows that vote Democrat.
Without looking, ‘m going to guess the dispute is about the number of spider genders.
Did they ever ask a bug man?
My dad worked for Terminex for a while and told me once about a pretty creepy infestation. I’m thinking now, that they must have been pretty social to congregate in that trashed home. Yuk.
The itsy bitsy creepy spider climbed up the govt. waterspout to find out what it was all about. I hate spiders, the only things worse are centipedes and millipedes and large bugs in SE Asia like in the Philippines. I once worked for a friends dad who was an exterminator when I was a teenager, I didn’t do very well in tight crawl spaces underneath houses killing spiders. I was also very skinny back then and could fit into tight crawl spaces, not any more.
It’s all about the manipulation of statistical data in order to have the results match the hypothesis. Blah blah blah.
I do like spiders though. Would have loved to have been in that pitch meeting with God.
Me: “Yeah, so eight legs, giant fangs…60 or seventy eyes…oh yeah, and it shoots sticky rope out of it’s butt.”
God: “…..I’ma take the next day off…”
Ml now thats a science spider video
God also created the mosquito.
Ima spider xpert. My wife scream, I smash it.
Every third spider I spy on my property is a black widow. I usually leave them alone as they do not appear to want to live in the house. Garage yes! but not the house! Funny, these days I spend most of my time in the garage, but those widows don’t seem to mind.
“The first stage in the corruption of morals is the banishment of truth …”
Michel de Montaigne
Spiders = Extreme Engineering + Efficient Killing Machine
”Unlike the original authors, the team released video of each experiment, for example, as well as the bootstrap analysis code.”
Well, there’s your problem. AOC say bootstrap be impossible.
Geoff….you’re lucky God designed mosquitoes and not me. I would have made them explode in tiny mushroom clouds once their bellies were full of blood.
“I would have made them explode in tiny mushroom clouds once their bellies were full of blood”
Actually they do if you catch one biting you and squeeze about half inch below their tunnel of nutrition. It’s very satisfying.
Here’s some trivia. On average, you are never more than three feet from a spider. Sleep well tonight.
Well. They are definitely sociable. Had a large gray spider who nested in a corner of one of my windows. It wasn’t causing a problem, so I just left it alone.
Big mistake. One day, I happened to look at that window and what seemed like hundreds of baby spiders were streaming from the big mama spider.
Creepest thing I ever saw. Got the spider spray and the whole family was history.
Way understood…spiders that is…not the asshole researchers.
The webs are wonders to behold especially in the wind.
The Brooklyn Bridge is a modern day engineering spider web.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brooklyn_Bridge#/media/File:USA-NYC-Brooklyn_Bridge3.jpg
Scientists say Zombies are “For Real”.
A group of scientists and doctors from the prestigious University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine released a scientific article today entitled “Zombies – Fact or Fiction?”
The article is the result of a yearlong study of the regeneration of human life after death has thought to have been established. The group of scientists received a grant of 5.4 million dollars from the National Academy of Sciences 1 million dollars from a foundation headed George Soros.
The scientists worked closely with Dr. Oliver Toussaint of New Orleans, who has worked in the human life regeneration field for over 30 years. Dr. Toussaint is also the pastor of the Life Regeneration Living Rock Church in New Orleans, and leader of the movement that goes by the same name. Some critics have labelled Dr. Toussaint a “Witch Doctor”, and a “fraud”, but Dr. Toussaint’s movement has received 6.5 million dollars in grant money every year since 2009 from the US Government’s Department of Health and Human Services. Dr.Toussaint has made powerful friends in Washington, including former Presidents Obama, Clinton, and Carter.
In a press conference today, Dr. Alan Weisenheimer, the leader and spokesperson of the University of Pennsylvania group, told reporters that the first thing mankind needs to do is to recognize that death is very complicated: “We see death as multi-phased and think there are at least three stages – Death-Con 1, Death-Con 2, and Death-Con 3. In Death-Con 1, a person can be brought back to life, Death-Con 2 is iffy and requires a lot more study. Death-Con 3 is after major decomposition has set in, and bringing back life to a rotting corpse is problematical, if not impossible. But with Dr. Toussaint’s help, we have made a lot of strides in our understanding.”
During an experiment at New Orleans General Hospital in February, the U of P group were eyewitnesses to Dr. Toussaint’s successful attempt to bring a man back to life. A 47 year old African-American man had been pronounced dead 3 days prior to the experiment, from a combination of factors including heart disease, clogged arteries, and high blood pressure. The U of P first established that the man was truly dead by modern medical standards by observing that the man was not breathing, had no blood pressure or pulse, etc., then let Dr. Toussaint proceed with his “life regeneration” methods. Dr. Toussaint began by chanting over the corpse, which he explained as “Island/Haitian/Creole folkloric incantations” and sprinkling “life-awareness herbs” on his face, and rubbing the mans arms and torso with a stick made from the wood of an African Boab tree that is older than 10,000 years.
After 30 seconds of this treatment, the U of P team noticed the man’s neck muscles and eyelids moving. After 2 minutes, as Dr. Weisenheimer explained: “The man’s eyes opened up wide and he sat bolt upright. Then, he got up off the gurney and stumbled around. He actually bumped into me. None of us thought he was still dead. We were speechless. After a few more minutes, he collapsed. Somehow we knew then he was really dead and beyond even Dr. Toussaint’s help. We were all elated at Dr. Toussaint’s experiment, except Dr. Toussaint himself. He said he’s kept people alive for months and even years after death, but this was a difficult case, because the man had a very weak “elemental life spirit”.
Dr. Weisenheimer explained that his group was very confidant that no trickery had been used. The U of P group was also pleased that Dr. Toussaint appears to be very professional with an excellent head for scientific study: “We noticed that the doctor didn’t use any religious mumbo-jumbo, crosses, bibles, prayers, and so forth. Dr. Toussant’s “elemental life spirit” concept has a foundation in real science. We know that electrical impulses remain in the body for a considerable time after death. It’s a matter of finding that tiny flame, fanning it, and giving it some more fuel. That’s real life regeneration”.
Dr. Weisenheimer said he was looking forward to continued funding and support from the US Government to pursue the important work in the “life regeneration” sciences. “Death is all too common. We want to tell death to Take a Hike”, Dr. Weisenheimer said.
I keep telling my wife: Spiders are your friends. She’s not buying it. If there is anything more fearful to her than spiders, it’s firearms.
:Note to self:
“manufacture tiny guns for spiders”