Gravity Probe B Is in the Air

I no longer remember the context, but the Gravity Probe B experiment came up in discussion around the department last week, and nobody could really remember what the status of it was. It came up again during the “Physics: What We Don’t Understand” panel Saturday morning, where Geoff Landis was able to supply a few… Continue reading Gravity Probe B Is in the Air

links for 2009-02-17

immlass: You have no privacy. Get over it. "Facebook may be sleazy and selling more of your information than you like to advertisers, but the idea it wants to steal your IP and do something with it seems vanishingly unlikely. I suspect the change in TOS has something to do with protecting their asses against… Continue reading links for 2009-02-17

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Quantum Physics for Dogs: Many Worlds, Many Treats?

On Saturday at Boskone, I gave a talk on the Many-Worlds Interpretation of QM. This was held up a bit by waiting for the projector to arrive (I was busy enough with other stuff that I didn’t notice that I hadn’t received confirmation of my request for a projector until late Thursday night, so this… Continue reading Quantum Physics for Dogs: Many Worlds, Many Treats?

links for 2009-02-14

Notes on sociopathy "Sometimes, a day of interacting with the rest of the human race on the roads and streets leaves you convinced that the world would be a much nicer place if most newborn humans were tossed in a burlap sack with some stones and then deposited in the nearest pond. But here’s the… Continue reading links for 2009-02-14

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Happy News Open Thread

I’ve been a Grumpy Blogger this week, what with one thing and another (some of my general malaise has finally resolved into a cold, which I suspect explains a lot). I’m headed to Boskone for the weekend, though, so let’s end the week on a positive note. I’m declaring this a Happy News Open Thread:… Continue reading Happy News Open Thread

Darwin’s Birthday Baby Blogging 021209

It’s Darwin’s 200th birthday today, and SteelyKid is wearing her ladybug outfit to celebrate: If you can’t make it out, the outfit is pink, and covered with little pink and orange ladybugs. The feet are larger ladybugs, complete with antennae. Why is this an appropriate Dawrin’s Birthday outfit, you ask?

links for 2009-02-12

Different Cliffs, Different Bottoms, Different Parachutes « Easily Distracted "If one of the goals of stimulus is to get American consumers shopping again, then I think it’s going to take some substantial changes to the entire retail landscape for that to be more than a momentary upward blip in a relentlessly downward spiral. And at… Continue reading links for 2009-02-12

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Happy 200th Birthday…

…Abraham Lincoln. Yeah, most of ScienceBlogs is celebrating Darwin’s birthday, but I don’t have anything interesting to say about that. Actually, I don’t have anything all that interesting to say about Lincoln, either, but given that he’s unquestionably one of the two greatest Presidents (neck and neck with Washington, both ahead of FDR), I wouldn’t… Continue reading Happy 200th Birthday…