At least, that’s the obvious conclusion from the Royal Society’s Science Sees Further page. The introduction touts it as “a series of articles on some of the most exciting areas of science today,” but what’s striking to me is that none of the twelve topic listed (Ageing Process, Biological Diversity, Cognition and Computation, Cultural Evolution,… Continue reading Physics Is No Longer Exciting
Month: November 2010
Definitions and Standards
Somebody asked a question at the Physics Stack Exchange site about the speed of light and the definition of the meter that touches on an issue I think is interesting enough to expand on a little here. The questioner notes that the speed of light is defined to be 299,792,458 m/s and the meter is… Continue reading Definitions and Standards
Links for 2010-11-30
What correlates with problem solving skill? | Casting Out Nines “About a year ago, I started partitioning up my Calculus tests into three sections: Concepts, Mechanics, and Problem Solving. The point values for each are 25, 25, and 50 respectively. […] I did this to stress to students that the main goal of taking a… Continue reading Links for 2010-11-30
Over-Ruled
I’m a big fan of (American) football, but a lot of people are surprised to learn that I never played organized football. It was largely a matter of timing– the coaches when I was in junior high were not people I’d’ve been interested in playing for, and when they hired a good guy to run… Continue reading Over-Ruled
Links for 2010-11-29
Our Boring Future | Mother Jones A variant on Joe Fitzsimon’s comment on Twitter: “How to be a futurist in 1 easy step: confuse logistic curves for unbounded exponential growth.” (tags: society social-science politics blogs kevin-drum) Making Light: “We live underground. We speak with our hands.” “Somewhere in our brave new century, somebody actually pays… Continue reading Links for 2010-11-29
Links for 2010-11-28
TopatoCo: Dinosaur Comics Dry Erase Whiteboard (Temporarily Out of Stock) Something to get for that person who has always wanted to write their own dinosaur comics, but is too lazy to PhotoShop their own text in. (tags: comics internet silly gadgets) Surviving the World – Lesson 813 – One View Of The Afterlife Know your… Continue reading Links for 2010-11-28
Links for 2010-11-27
Why hasn’t the war against terrorism produced any great First Amendment cases? – By Dahlia Lithwick – Slate Magazine “There seems to be no one answer to why there hasn’t been a single important First Amendment protest case in the last decade. It’s certainly not that the court is reluctant to rule on First Amendment… Continue reading Links for 2010-11-27
How to Teach Physics to Your Dog, Black Friday Edition
Today is “Black Friday,” the semi-ironic name given to the day after Thanksgiving when major retailers roll out Incredible! Deals! to draw shoppers in at an ungodly early hour. Personally, I don’t plan to come within a mile of a mall today, but if that’s what floats your boat… Of course, if you’re thinking of… Continue reading How to Teach Physics to Your Dog, Black Friday Edition
Short Story Club Wrap-Up
The first rule of Short Story Club is that you must talk about Short Story Club… So, the Short Story Club run by Niall Harrison over at Torque Control is finished, and Niall’s asking for concluding thoughts. I meant to write this up last night, but SteelyKid had a major meltdown just before bedtime, so… Continue reading Short Story Club Wrap-Up
Links for 2010-11-26
Gender gap in physics exams reduced by simple writing exercises, says CU-Boulder study “Women are underrepresented and on average perform more poorly than men in introductory physics. But a recent study finds that this gap arises predominantly from differential preparation prior to college and psychological factors, rather than differences in ability. And the effects of… Continue reading Links for 2010-11-26