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Wanna read my book and help out skepticism at the same time? Australian skeptic (and my drobbly friend) Richard Saunders has a copy up for auction on eBay.
What makes this copy special is that Richard attended TAM 7 and got signatures from many notable skeptics at the meeting. These include James Randi, the Skeptics’ Guide to the Universe team, George Hrab, Michael Shermer, Derek Colanduno, Joe Nickell, Simon Singh, and many others… as well as the book’s author.
The auction ends on July 21 (or when an asteroid wipes out all life on Earth, whatever happens first), so if you want this unique item, better get moving!
July 15th, 2009 at 4:06 pm
Well, if an asteroid wipes out all life on Earth, won’t that lessen the demand? Better to wait for an All Clear before bidding.
July 15th, 2009 at 4:18 pm
Shuttle Endeavour launched successfully.
Separated from main booster as planned.
It looks good!
http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/nasatv/index.html
July 15th, 2009 at 4:20 pm
OT, Endeavour launched but apparently experienced wing or heat shield damage on the way up.
July 15th, 2009 at 4:37 pm
Darn, already got my copy.
July 15th, 2009 at 4:39 pm
http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/shuttle/main/index.html
Endeavour Reaches Orbit
Thu, 16 Jul 2009 10:12:21 AM GMT+1200
Main engine cutoff is confirmed: space shuttle Endeavour has reached orbit. The shuttle lifted off from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida as planned 6:03 p.m. EDT and began its orbital chase of the International Space Station, orbiting 225 miles above Earth’s surface.
July 15th, 2009 at 5:26 pm
OT, The Big Picture is fulla awesome with Apollo Pictures. Those images are always really inspiring to me.
http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2009/07/remembering_apollo_11.html
July 15th, 2009 at 5:27 pm
Back On Topic: One of these days I’m going to have enough money to bid at these auctions. Alas! I must scrimp and save for now.
July 15th, 2009 at 5:44 pm
I wasn’t aware you had a book. Perhaps you could mention it on here every now and then…
July 15th, 2009 at 6:10 pm
No Swoopy? That’s a dealbreaker….
July 15th, 2009 at 6:31 pm
Simon Singh was in Sydney last night giving a his Trick Or Treatment lecture. A most entertaining evening up to and including the participation of homeopaths during the question time. What’s up with homeopaths needing to tell us that they have a degree in textiles from Leeds University? Actually I recall now. She was giving us her scientific credentials. Like textiles have anything to do with practicing homeopathy.
Click my name to see a few pictures I took during the evening.
Now that Phil has spilled the beans on the many signatured book it looks like we poor Aussies will eventually be outbid by you rich Americans. I will bid what I can I suppose. It is a good cause.
I hope this isn’t a double post. The first attempt appears to have been swallowed by the spam filter.
July 15th, 2009 at 8:37 pm
Missed a -8 Iridium flare tonight because clouds swept in just before, and left just after. ARGH!
And while I’m already off-topic, it would be cool if there was a daily post maybe called “***** From the Skies!” just for everyones comments about cool things happening up above us, so we’re not always jacking threads.
July 15th, 2009 at 8:39 pm
Romeo Vitelli @ #1,
Yes, what you say is true. Better to have the competition wiped out first, and then go for the kill.
July 15th, 2009 at 9:05 pm
Bid placed. I am torn, I would love to win, but I would also love for Richard and his Skepticzone crew to be able to get their flights to Perth and I dont think I can afford to go that high.
July 15th, 2009 at 9:20 pm
OT, but I mentioned a day or two ago that I got my Galileoscope. Well now I have pictures and stuff. Click my name for more.
Back On Topic, there is a new airline in Oz that is offering ridiculously low fares at the moment but they don’t fly direct Sydney to Perth. But, we were mucking around with routes and you can get from Melbourne to Perth for a bit over $100 and Sydney to Melbourne for about $40. That would save hundreds of dollars and that may keep the book in reach of us mere mortals assuming Richard and crew don’t get a millionaire benefactor to front up thousands of dollars.
July 15th, 2009 at 9:22 pm
You wrote a book?
July 15th, 2009 at 9:33 pm
Good luck with the auction, great idea!
July 15th, 2009 at 11:06 pm
Do I want to bid for a copy – yes!
Can I afford to do so right now … Sadly no.
(Somehow I don’t think the BA will take Plutonian roubles – will he?
)
Oh well, good luck with it anyway – & if you do get to visit Perth (the Australian Perth not Scottish (Is it?) one I’m assuming …) then please think of travelling those few (well few thousand) extra klicks and visiting Adelaide in South Australia too! I’d make you very welcome!
July 16th, 2009 at 7:22 am
Apparently, the current bid is 200 Astronomical Units. That is far…
July 16th, 2009 at 10:51 am
Something made Gmail think that your newsletter was fraudulent. Not only it moved it to my Spam folder, but when I recovered it to my Inbox it still wouldn’t let me see the email’s images or follow its links. There was a red bar on top of the e-mail identifying it as Phishing.
I think it was this article, because it mentions eBay but it wasn’t sent from ebay.com and the Phishing filters may be too strict.
Anyway, here’s what Gmail’s Help page recommends: “If our system flags a message as phishing, but you’ve validated the source from which the message originated, click the down arrow next to Reply at the top-right of the message pane, and select Report Not Phishing to let us know the message is legitimate.”
After doing that, the mail will be back to normal, with images and links.
July 16th, 2009 at 12:44 pm
Oh, already got a copy. Not that I could afford to bid it anyways.
July 16th, 2009 at 4:02 pm
Damn, can’t go any higher.
July 16th, 2009 at 7:45 pm
300 Aussie shekels now.
July 16th, 2009 at 11:58 pm
Can’t afford it, but do you suppose if I buy a copy at Amazon or somewhere similar, I can collect similar signatures myself at next year’s TAM? I’m planning on being there.
July 21st, 2009 at 5:39 am
Nice – final tally 781 golden koalas.