society
pontiff | July 18, 2008The Scienceborg is all abuzz about some Sizzle movie, with all sorts of good and bad reviews, and gnashing of the teeth about whether the movie stunk or whether it was the best thing since the invention of sliced ham (few know that this event was much more important than the invention of sliced bread, which is vastly overhyped.) A good way to waste your time, I suppose, but I thought I wasn't going to get much out of it, you known, in terms of actually getting any good insight or educational crap like that. But then I discovered Chris C. Mooney's post on the whole thing. (Chris is lucky,…
drorzel | July 16, 2008Just before we turn the corner, a woman goes jogging past with a Golden Retriever. As we continue on our way, I can hear the Doberman three houses up barking at them as they go past. The windows muffle the sound, but I can make out a bit of it. "Get offa my lawn! Gonna bite you! My lawn!"
When we reach the end of their driveway, Emmy immediately squats. The Doberman goes nuts. "My lawn! Kill you! Go away! My lawn! Kill you!" Emmy hackles all over, all the way down to her tail, and makes little distressed noises.
When we get clear of the Doberman's yard, and the barking subsides, she stops and…
clock | July 14, 2008Yes, I am one of many SciBlings and other bloggers who got offered to pre-screen Randy Olson's new movie "Sizzle" (check the Front Page of scienceblogs.com for links to all the others). I was reluctant at first, but in the end I gave in and agreed to preview a copy. Why was I reluctant? As a scientist, I need to start my piece with a bunch of neatly organized caveats, so here are the reasons why I thought I would not be a good person to review the movie:
- I am just not a good movie critic. Of the thousands of movies I have seen in my life, I disliked perhaps three. I am terribly…
clock | July 14, 2008Speaking of educational science videos, how about advertising? Many science bloggers are commenting about this ad by Eppendorf (and I got the link by e-mail a few times as well):
We had manual pipetters, battery-operated pipetters and an automated pipetter in the lab. I have no idea who the manufacturer was - must have been one with the best price when we were shopping. So, what do you think - will this be effective?
clock | July 13, 2008Georgia Harper saw an interesting article in USA Today about Open textbooks and, among else, says:
Open access is just one part of a much bigger and more complex picture. I am very optimistic that open access will find its way into the book market (or what we call books today), but again, it's not like that will cut off the flow of revenues. Quite the contrary. It just makes it possible for a lot more people to benefit from the work of authors while authors and those who help them ready their works for public consumption still reap sufficient financial rewards to make creating worthwhile.…
clock | July 9, 2008Jim Evans, my friend here at UNC, says Yes, in an interview with NYTimes, and again on NPR's People's Pharmacy. He teaches a course on genetics to judges:
A lot of judges report that they did prelaw in college because it did not involve science. One of my favorite judges, a brilliant man, is fond of telling people he "flunked science in kindergarten." So in these workshops, I think of myself as a newfangled type of science teacher, instructing extremely smart and distinguished adults in science fundamentals.
drorzel | July 7, 2008John Allen Paulos's Innumeracy is one of those classics of the field that I've never gotten around to reading. I've been thinking more about these sorts of issues recently, though, so when the copy I bought a few years ago turned up in our recent book-shuffling, I decided to give it a read.
Unfortunately, I probably would've been a lot more impressed had I read it when it first came out in 1988. Most of the examples used to illustrate his point that people are generally very bad with numbers are exceedingly familiar. They appear in How to Lie With Statistics, and the recent The Drunkard's…
pontiff | July 1, 2008One of the subjects of great debate in physics goes under the moniker of "the arrow of time." The basic debate here is (very) roughly to try to understand why time goes it's merry way seemingly in one direction, especially given that the many of the laws of physics appear to behave the same going backwards as forwards in time. But aren't we forgetting our most basic science when we debate at great philosophical lengths about the arrow of time? Aren't we forgetting about...experiment? Here, for your pleasure, then, are some of my personal observations about the direction of time which I've…
drorzel | June 18, 2008A bunch of academic bloggers have been talking about the American Scholar essay by William Deresiewicz. The always-perceptive Timothy Burke offers some insightful comments about the general problems of elite education.
Burke is also a lot kinder to Deresiewicz than I'm inclined to be. Because, frankly, the piece pisses me off, from the very first paragraph:
It didn't dawn on me that there might be a few holes in my education until I was about 35. I'd just bought a house, the pipes needed fixing, and the plumber was standing in my kitchen. There he was, a short, beefy guy with a goatee and a…
clock | June 15, 2008I briefly noted this study yesterday, but now W. D. Craft analyzes it in great detail:
I am pessimistic that the authors' more careful conclusions and recommendations will be noticed. Instead I fear we're in for more naive calls for "abstinence education" and coerced virginity pledges.
clock | June 14, 2008You have to act quickly, though:
We've been airing audio comments on our new national public radio
show, The Takeaway (http://www.thetakeaway.org), for the past couple
of weeks. On Monday, we want to highlight your scientificky thoughts
on "THE INCREDIBLE HULK" and "THE HAPPENING".
There's a lot of genetics and plant biology and global warming stuff
there to sink your teeth into. Here's what we're looking for: By
Sunday at 3 p.m. Eastern, tell us two things about whichever movie you
saw:
1. ONE-PHRASE CAPSULE REVIEW -- IT'S QUICK AND EASY!
Say, "It was __________". Put an adjective or…
clock | June 14, 2008Obligatory Reading of the Day: The crazies and Obama:
If there is a President Obama come next Jan. 20, normal folks better brace for what the right-wing crazies have in mind. Because it's becoming clear that they are winding themselves up now for a fresh spate of violence if Obama wins.
You can find the signs in the things they're saying now, both on Internet forums and in the things they say when they think no one is listening.
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In any event, a pattern is already developing, ranging from the Klan fellows who promise that Obama will be shot to the white supremacists…
clock | June 11, 2008After two years of raising awareness about living with HIV, Ron Hudson has decided to end the International Carnival of Pozitivities. The very last edition is now up on Black Looks.
clock | June 9, 2008Some teens pulled a nasty prank and posted a video of it on YouTube. As a part of their sentence, the judge ordered them to make another video, with the apology and to post that on YouTube. There are several similar prank videos on YouTube so I do not know which one is this one, but the apology video is here.
clock | June 6, 2008....so I never get to the point at which I am driven to behave like this:
One day soon, people will look back at videos like this one and wonder in astonishment that people in the past had to go to a place to work! That there used to be such a thing as the office! And that people wasted time, energy and polluting materials in order to get there! And that there was such a thing as a mental division between 'Work' and 'Life'! And that people traveled short distances every day instead of long trips every now and then, just to see the world... Increased mobility (in physical and cyber space)…
drorzel | June 6, 2008How will you know, unless you take this Internet quiz?
(I get a 78 on the Husband scale ("Very Superior"), so yay, me. Of course, if I answer the Wife questions, I get a 16 ("Very Poor (Failure)")... Which, given the preposterous sexism of the standards, probably also counts as a "yay, me!")
clock | June 3, 2008Have you ever heard of TOMS Shoes? Apparently, this has been going on for two years now. Blake Mycoskie is making these shoes and, whenever you buy a pair for yourself, he sends another pair to a poor child in the developing world.
clock | June 2, 2008Whatever happened to recess? I can't imagine a school day without one! This is a crime.