Comments on: Science Flunkie Explains Evolutionary Science to Child, Gets Lesson In Gemology

By: lynD

lynD — Wed, 10 Jan 2007 16:45:26 +0000

Hi,
I received a rock tumbler a few years ago (not as kick-ass as yours, but still!), and LOVED it until my electric bill showed up. I nearly fainted. I pledge $50 towards your next electric bill.

Cheers,
L

By: Jill

Jill — Wed, 10 Jan 2007 05:59:13 +0000

Some of us are still awaiting a picture of this ring. Ahem.

By: ScottM

ScottM — Mon, 08 Jan 2007 22:56:32 +0000

If you want to throw something interesting back, tell him that here on earth, there are bacteria that eat sulfur and excrete sulfuric acid. They live in hot springs…

Here’s a link to Bacterial Snots.

By: foresmac

foresmac — Mon, 08 Jan 2007 16:06:24 +0000

I dig Chef. Especially his sweet, sweet ass. Oh, were we talking about geology?

By: zuzu

zuzu — Mon, 08 Jan 2007 05:13:37 +0000

I grew up in New Jersey, and was always told that during the Ice Age, North Jersey was covered in glacier, while South Jersey wasn’t. This apparently has something to do with why Jersey tomatoes are so good and why it’s the Garden State.

Plus, it’s apparently also a reason why there are so many stone walls in New England.

By: Amanda Marcotte

Amanda Marcotte — Mon, 08 Jan 2007 01:48:49 +0000

I grew up in one of the world’s foremost geologist-attracting areas, so I love driving people through it and pointing out the giant mountains and cliffs and saying, “Did you know the Southwest used to be under the ocean and all these mountains were laid down by the shifting waters of the ocean?” And then they look again and see the Giant Fucking Sedimentary Rocks where they just saw mountains before and you can see the knowledge dawning of how old the earth is, its age jutting up around you as you drive along. It’s humbling.

So to say “the Southwest used to be under the ocean” is just a fact gathered on one hand. On the other, it is one of those small but relevant keys that can really open up the mind to the large world outside.

I’m totally psyched you see that minds that work like that are good for the sciences. If more parents saw that in their children….

By: Roxanne

Roxanne — Sun, 07 Jan 2007 18:41:52 +0000

Rock tumblers are worth the noise. Put it out on the back porch and make a rule that he can only run it during the day.

By: Robert

Robert — Sun, 07 Jan 2007 18:08:43 +0000

Poke around on Freecycle and/or Craigslist, and look for an old dot matrix printer muffling box. Back In The Day ™, when dot matrix printers were all there were, the high-end fast printers were incredibly noisy - like 140 dB noisy - and people built foam-lined noise suppression chambers for them. Those boxes have little value today, and if you can find someone who has one clogging up their hall closet, you can probably get it for nothing. You can even seal up the slots the boxes had for paper feeding and get even less noise.

By: Ron O

Ron O — Sun, 07 Jan 2007 14:34:07 +0000

Hell, I dig Chef too. And Ethan. His passion for geology and science is very cool. I’m old enough now to see those initial passions have sometimes remained with my younger relatives.

Dad had one of those tumblers when we were kids. It kept us busy for a while looking for pretty rocks. And it was loud! We kept it behind a door in the basement and could hear it on the second floor.

By: Adrienne

Adrienne — Sun, 07 Jan 2007 03:45:36 +0000

Lauren, can you please publish a book–or at least a pamphlet–on How to Raise A Kick-Ass Kid? This is information that is clearly lacking from modern child-rearing books.