Confessions of a Community College Dean: The Boy, On Scientists "My hero is a scientist. Every day they mak EXITING discoveries. They also make AWESOME potions, space probes and cool new ships. They launch rockets and space ships. I like it when the Space Shuttle goes up. It always makes me think of the scientists… Continue reading links for 2009-04-30
Author: Chad Orzel
Email from Andrei Derevianko
I got email this afternoon from Andrei Derevianko, the leader of the research project badly described by the press release mentioned in the previous post. He sounds a little surprised by the whole thing (though not much more surprised than I am that my griping on the Internet got brought to anybody’s attention), and explains… Continue reading Email from Andrei Derevianko
The LHC Gets Credit for Atomic Theory
A wonderfully incoherent press release came across my EurekAlert feeds yesterday, with the headline “Particle physics study finds new data for extra Z-bosons and potential fifth force of nature.” You can tell it’s going to make no sense at all from the very first sentence: The Large Hadron Collider is an enormous particle accelerator whose… Continue reading The LHC Gets Credit for Atomic Theory
What An Editor Does, and Why It Matters
I’ve had the Quiche Moraine post on editing open in a browser tab for far too long, now, but it deserves a more prominent comment than just a link in the daily links dump. It really is an excellent presentation of the important role of editing: Editing requires the strange ability to stand in the… Continue reading What An Editor Does, and Why It Matters
links for 2009-04-29
Gallery: Flickr users make accidental maps – tech – 27 April 2009 – New Scientist "Billions of photos have now been uploaded to the internet, and many are tagged with text descriptions. Some are even geotagged â stamped with the latitude and longitude coordinates at which the image was taken. David Crandall and colleagues at… Continue reading links for 2009-04-29
Show Me the Pony
So, the President gave some sort of speech to a bunch of smart people yesterday (video, transcript), and hearts are a-flutter all over the science blogosphere, as President Obama promises great things for science: We double the budget of key agencies, including the National Science Foundation, a primary source of funding for academic research, and… Continue reading Show Me the Pony
Dead Dinosaurs and Denialism
Yesterday, EurekAlert served up a press release titled New blow for dinosaur-killing asteroid theory, reporting on Gerta Keller of Princeton, who says that the Chicxulub crater isn’t really from the asteroid impact that killed the dinosaurs. Keller thinks the crater had nothing to do with the extinction event, and claims to have found evidence that… Continue reading Dead Dinosaurs and Denialism
It’s Hard Work Being a Baby
Well, it is. What with the jumping around, and the giggling, and waving toys in the air, and the tickling and giggling, and taking a walk in the stroller… It just tires a baby right out.
Time Scales, on Campus and in the Blogosphere
My major “service” activity at work is involvement with the Minerva program, which attempts to blur the line between academic and residential life. I enjoy this because it gives me the opportunity to work closely with students outside a narrow academic context, and I’ve been very impressed with the creativity and responsibility of the students… Continue reading Time Scales, on Campus and in the Blogosphere
links for 2009-04-28
Acephalous: Concerning the inherent superiority of printed text to irresponsible online drivel. "Is it absolutely necessary for the image gracing the cover of the most recent issue of the official mouthpiece of my professional organization to depict something that, when seen on my desk by a colleague from another department, compelled her to ask where… Continue reading links for 2009-04-28