November 9, 2010
I haven't been doing these as regularly as I was earlier in the year, but here are a few interesting bits of news about How to Teach Physics to Your Dog:
LA FISICA SPIEGATA AL MIO CANE, is now available. That's the Italian edition, which Google translates to something like "Explaining Physics to…
November 9, 2010
I'm taking a bit of flak in comments to my silly Bob Dylan post from Sunday, with various right-wingers spontaneously popping in to tell me that JFK cut taxes. My initial reaction to this is to think that supposing a perfect equivalence between JFK cutting the top rate from 90% to 70% during a time…
November 9, 2010
Moving Toward Quantum Computing - Science in 2011 - NYTimes.com
"In 1981 the physicist Richard Feynman speculated about the possibility of "tiny computers obeying quantum mechanical laws." He suggested that such a quantum computer might be the best way to simulate real-world quantum systems, a…
November 8, 2010
The American Institute of Physics has a statistics division that produces lots of interesting analyses of issues relevant to the discipline. A couple of them were released just recently, including one on the job status of new Ph.D.'s (PDF). The key graph from the report is this one:
The text of…
November 8, 2010
Last week's guess-the-number contest for my spare copy of Massive by Ian Sample generated over 150 comments. So, who won? Well, I said at the time:
I am thinking of an integer between 0 and 1000 (inclusive). The person who comes closest to guessing the number by midnight Eastern time Friday,…
November 8, 2010
Sunday Function : Built on Facts
"[T]he idea of function as a machine is such a powerful and intuitive one that it tends to be used pretty universally until you have a good reason to abandon it. Non-mathematicians rarely encounter such reasons, even in the more mathematically demanding…
November 7, 2010
I bought the Witmark Demos a week or so ago, because I could always use another 50 Bob Dylan songs, and listening to them on shuffle play has managed to earworm me with one song in particular, "I Shall Be Free", which it occurs to me has great current relevance:
Well, my telephone rang it would not…
November 7, 2010
Democrats didn't lose the battle of 2010. They won it. - By William Saletan - Slate Magazine
"Politicians have tried and failed for decades to enact universal health care. This time, they succeeded. In 2008, Democrats won the presidency and both houses of Congress, and by the thinnest of margins…
November 6, 2010
This week's Short Story Club story is "The Heart of a Mouse" by K. J. Bishop, from Subterranean Press (which means I'm faintly surprised not to have to pay $15 for it). I recognize Bishop's name, and think I have a copy of The Etched City upstairs that I've never gotten around to reading, but don't…
November 6, 2010
Having written in defense of analogies in physics yesterday, I should note that not all of the analogies that are brought out in an attempt to clarify physics concepts are good. For example, there's this incredibly strained opening to a Science News article on entanglement:
If the Manning brothers…
November 6, 2010
Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal
Schrodinger's job interview.
(tags: silly physics history comics smbc)
NASA Space Games | Wired Science | Wired.com
"The future is now. NASA wants to start playing space games. Check out this NASA Spaced Out Sports Design Challenge. Unfortunately, the challenge…
November 5, 2010
I haven't been flogging it as hard as in some past years, but the DonorsChoose Blogger Challenge is still going on, though it wraps up on Tuesday. To date, we've raised just over $1,300 to support education in needy schools, which is great, and thanks to all those who have donated.
If you haven't…
November 5, 2010
Regular commenter onymous left a comment to my review of Warped Passages that struck me as a little odd:
The extended analogy between the renormalization group and a bureaucracy convinced me that she was trying way too hard to make sophisticated concepts comprehensible. Also, I'm not really sure…
November 5, 2010
Five close-approach images of Hartley 2 by Deep Impact, with commentary - The Planetary Society Blog | The Planetary Society
"Here's the five close-approach images of Hartley 2 captured today, November 4, 2010, by the Deep Impact spacecraft, collected into one file. Boy, do these images reward…
November 4, 2010
Welcome to this very-carefully-posed edition of Thursday Toddler Blogging:
That's Kate and SteelyKid reading The Cat in the Hat,shot from a slightly odd angle so as to hide the wicked shiner that SteelyKid is sporting, thanks to a tumble down the stairs on Tuesday morning (while I was getting…
November 4, 2010
I can't resist interrupting the relatively productive day I'm having working on the new book to point you to Conversación de fÃsica con mi perro, the Spanish-language edtion of How to Teach Physics to Your Dog, which sports this spiffy cover:
I haven't seen a physical copy of this yet, but the…
November 4, 2010
I'm spending the day trying to get some work done on the book-in-progress, so I'm avoiding both work- and blog-related stuff. I don't want to leave the site completely quiet, though, so here's a question to ponder, relating to SteelyKid's continuing fascination with Goodnight Moon:
How does a cow…
November 4, 2010
Blog U.: 7 Ways College Has Improved Since 91 - Technology and Learning - Inside Higher Ed
"We spend so much time worrying about what is wrong with our U.S. higher ed system that it is easy to lose sight of how much the system has improved over the past 20 years. This is a mistake, as if we fail…
November 3, 2010
In a case of poor communication between publicists, I have ended up with not one but two advance copies of Massive by Ian Sample, a forthcoming book about the Higgs Boson. As I barely have time to read one, I don't remotely need two; thus, I will dispose of one with a really simple contest:
I am…
November 3, 2010
I have nothing useful or interesting to say about electoral politics, but I suspect that's all people will want to read about today. So here's a book post that's been backlogged for quite a while.
Lisa Randall's Warped Passages: Unraveling the Mysteries of the Universe's Hidden Dimensions dates…
November 3, 2010
Motorcycle tablecloth trick: could it be done? | Wired Science | Wired.com
"After watching this episode, a colleague had a great question:
"How fast would the MythBusters have to go to make this trick work?"
Interesting. In their last attempt, they had the motorcycle going around 100 mph. It did'…
November 2, 2010
Today's a lab day in my main class for the term, with a fairly involved experiment to measure the charge-to-mass ratio of the electron. This is going to be all kinds of fun, because 1) I can't get into the room to set anything up until an hour before the start of class, and 2) SteelyKid is home…
November 2, 2010
If you're in the US, go vote. Preferably for a candidate who isn't barking mad, but ultimately that's between you and your conscience.
If you're not in the US, or you've already voted, enjoy some cute, as SteelyKid is first skeptical about the idea of lots of kids in masks visiting the house:
Then…
November 1, 2010
In last weekend's post about arguments from innate differences, I suggested that I might be willing to illustrate my position with adorable toddler pictures. On thinking more about it, I'm a little hesitant to write about this at length, because it could easily topple over into arrogant-physicist…
November 1, 2010
Buddy Comedy Idea § Unqualified Offerings
"So, because the FBI has a habit of finding losers, coaxing them off the couch, holding their hands through the process of planning a terrorist attack, and then arresting them, let me propose this concept for a screenplay:"
(tags: movies politics writing…
October 31, 2010
Views: No Excuses, Mr. President - Inside Higher Ed
"Most parents and taxpayers consistently share the beliefs of most teachers about what needs to be done to improve our schools. An August Gallup/Phi Delta Kappa survey showed respondents agreeing with teachers that the largest problem with…
October 30, 2010
This week's Short Story Club entry is "My Father's Singularity" by Brenda Cooper. Who I keep having to remind myself is not the Brenda-with-a-surname-starting-with-C that I remember posting to rec.arts.sf.written back in the day (that was Brenda Clough).
This is set in the not-too-distant future in…
October 30, 2010
The Forever Blog « Easily Distracted
"There's been talk that blogs are over and Twitter and Facebook are king. I meant to say something about this issue when the end of Bitch Ph.D was announced, since that was an important blog for me and many other people. I think it's only half-right to say…
October 29, 2010
Chateau Steelypips lost power this morning for unknown reasons, preventing me from putting up the post I planned to do with lots of cute toddler pictures. Thus, a quickie poll in honor of the crazy person a couple of blocks away who sometimes yells at me for dropping Emmy's bagged poop into her…
October 29, 2010
The New York Times has a video highlighting particularly clever campaign commercials in the New York area, which includes this spot from my uncle John Orzel's state senate campaign:
I'm not aware of any polling regarding the race, so I have no idea how things will turn out next Tuesday. The word…
