This post is based on a demonstration I gave in the Skepchick Space Lab at CONvergence 2014 on the science of bubbles. If you saw the demo and came to check out the blog, welcome! (My post about the molecular gastronomy Sandbox will be up next week!) Below is a video of the demo, filmed by our wonderful volunteer Chris Pederson. A written version of the presentation is below the fold, followed by ... »
Over here at the lab we love us some good eating. And we have decided that Fridays are a great day to celebrate the art of cooking. In related news, fellow Skepchick and Mad Art Lab contributor, Courtney Caldwell has joined me in starting up a new food blog. The new blog is called, Be Vegan Anywhere and tells the tale of a Californian and a Texan navigating their way around their kitchens (and som... »
I recently attended the Women in Secularism event sponsored by The Center for Inquiry. This was the third event of its kind that focused on issues that directly affect women within the secular community and movement atheism. I am proud to say that I have attended all three conventions and it was truly an honor to speak at the last two. It was an experience I will forever be grateful for. This year... »
I want to thank every single person who contributed even a single selfie. You are all amazing. You are all beautiful. And it is your faces that helped me keep going. I love and respect all of you. I know it was hard. I bow down to you. Monday was the end of Operation Flawless, a social media campaign encouraging women to reject conventional beauty standards and post “unattractive” selfies. I spent... »
MAL’s very own Beth brought this sweetass article about the Wellcome image collection to my attention recently. The Wellcome Museum in London made 100,000 high resolution medical and art images available under a Creative Commons license. This includes photos, illustrations, manuscripts, paintings, etchings, sculptures, and artifacts. »
Hey Mad Art Lab! I’m Jamie. I usually write over at Skepchick Prime about statistics and politics and stuff like that, but I recently had a bit of an art quandary and Amy invited me to write a guest post about it over here at the cool kids’ corner of the Skepchick Network. As some of you may know, when I’m not spending my time playing with numbers or dating Jon Hamm*, I am taking photos. I’ve only... »
In case you’ve forgotten, a couple of months ago, Erin Gloria Ryan of Jezebel wrote a ridiculous article declaring selfies to be a “cry for help” and the ultimate anti-feminist act. Our own Surly Amy responded, schooling Ryan on the importance of self-portraits throughout history. Selfies give us the power to control the way the world sees us. We show ourselves at our best. We show the world that ... »
Rob and I love “The Walking Dead” and, though the girls cannot under any circumstance watch it, they have also become similarly obsessed with the concept of all things zombies with the help of the video game “Plants Vs. Zombies”. This year’s idea for Halloween costumes was an easy choice: Zombies! There were several reasons I wanted to try zombie costumes: Ease: All t... »
Thinking about this, I decided to think on the fandom which I am probably most concerned with: Wheel of Time. There are certainly lore based... – Jul 20, 4:11 PM
Adventure Time actually had fun with the fact that women's armor is always so fanservicey. Finn finds this armor that has all these powers and...won't... – Jul 20, 2:51 PM
"Am I the only one who finds clueless defensiveness really boring?" – Jul 17, 4:19 PM
Then again, Thor was once a frog. – Jul 17, 12:54 AM But, to answer your posed question: Yes. (I'm no more rational than anyone else.) My one real peeve is use of the word "sick" to... – Jul 15, 7:56 PM You claim that the word "literally" is "almost unusable for its original purpose." But wait -- exactly how recently do you think this change has... – Jul 15, 7:25 PM