dimland radio 9-15-18 show notes

A Dimland Radio Pedantic Moment: Close Encounters Of The Third Kind Again

Excellent forced perspective!

Yes, again. This time I explained how suspension of disbelief works for me. I can accept the main idea of this great film that there are extraterrestrials visiting earth, that they have far advanced technology, and that they can somehow implant ideas into people's minds. But the story has to stay within the rules it sets up for itself. And everything else in Close Encounters follows along with what would happen in the real world. Nothing feels out of place or wrong. Except how do the humans know how to respond when learning a "basic tonal language" without having been given any kind of key from which to learn? How did the government fellows know what to tell the musician to play back when the "conversation" started? Am I making sense?

I gave a made up example of potential rule breaking in another movie (Creature From The Black Lagoon - 1954) that would make it difficult to suspend disbelief. Impossible, even. And I noted an oddity about The Wolfman (1941), more than one actually. And I talked about my favorite deus ex machina moment that comes from Monty Python's Life Of Brian (1979).

I blogged about the whole Pedantic Moment I have regarding Close Encounters.

Beardless Jim

Jim

Beardless Jim

As a little stunt for my friends among the Minnesota Skeptics, I shaved off my mustache and beard. It has been 11 years since I had gone clean shaven.

Leading up to the big moment I had foregone trimming the facial hair. I'm gonna be shaving it off, so why bother. That means the before picture show the beard being much shaggier than I usually keep it. I don't care for a shaggy beard. On me, that is.

I also don't care for the clean shaven look. So the beard and mustache are growing back. By next month's meet-up, I will look as I should.

I also talked about the traffic and road construction woes that plague my sojourns to the meet-up location. Well, if you want nice, smooth, and reliable roads, construction delays are the price we pay. And taxes, of course. 

A Rant About Coffee Drinkers

When working as a janitor, I can get annoyed by some of the messes left behind. Not the kind of messes one would expect in a place of business due to the work being done. It's the unnecessary and avoidable messes that make me grind my teeth.

One such unnecessary mess is caused by coffee drinkers and their insistence on filling their coffee mugs as full as possible. They need that caffeine so much, they just can't leave any it of that mug unfilled, and off they go dripping coffee all along the way. And leaving coffee rings.

Coffee rings. Coffee rings. Coffee rings. 

A Dimland Radio Science Hero: Harrison Ford

I haven't been able to discover how Harrison Ford feels about GMOs or vaccination, but his stance on human-caused climate change and how the people of the world need to address it is right on. He has called for Americans, at least, to stop casting votes for anti-science political candidates, whether they're really anti-science or just pretending. 

An Anti-Vaxxer Or A Russian Troll?

The following anti-vax "facts" list was left in response to a pro-vaccination comment on Facebook:

My response? Listen to the show. ;)

Some anti-vax myths dispelled here. 

Also On The Show 

Hurricane Florence? Never fear! Pat and Kat have it under control! 

Three Cool Things

 

1) The above picture of our president gave me a chuckle, but I found something out about it, which I will talk about next week.

2) Aaron Rodgers, quarterback for the Green Bay Packers, added another story to his legend with his astounding second half (after a knee injury) performance against the Chicago Bears. Oh, if only the Vikings could have a quarterback like Rodgers. 

3) GQ has released a recent interview of Paul McCartney. There's a video of Paul talking about some of his classic Beatles and Wings tunes.

Music heard on the show...

Dimland Radio opening theme song: 'Ram' by The Yoleus 
First ad break bumpers: 'Head Over Heels' by The Go Go's & 'One Day' by The Church

Second ad break bumpers: 'Undertow' by Suzanne Vega & 'Twist' by Tones On Tail

Closing song: 'Angler's Treble Hook' by $5 Fiddle

That's it! See you next Saturday night for Dimland Radio 11 Central, midnight Eastern on www.ztalkradio.com you can also download my show from the z talk show archives page. You can email your questions and comments to drdim@dimland.com

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