Tom at Swans On Tea comments on an article about meetings: The most common meeting in my experience is the status meeting, where everyone gets together and reports on what they’ve accomplished. If it’s a small group, these are usually fine because you already have familiarity with the tasks. But when you get a large… Continue reading Meetings From Hell: Round Wire or Square Wire?
Category: Science
Quantum Switching of Light
Physics World posted a somewhat puzzling story a few days back, headlined Ultra cold atoms help share quantum information: Scientists in the US have demonstrated a novel “light-switch” in an optical fibre that could become a new tool in the communications industry. The device created by Michal Bajcsy at Harvard University and colleagues could be… Continue reading Quantum Switching of Light
Writing Is Easy, Except When It Isn’t
Tom Levenson has another excellent piece in his series on the writing of his forthcoming book on Newton, this one on hitting a wall: The one bit of history specific to the Newton and the Counterfeiter project came when I hit a wall. I had written about a quarter of the manuscript by the autumn… Continue reading Writing Is Easy, Except When It Isn’t
The Physics of NASCAR by Diandra Leslie-Pelecky
When this first came out, I didn’t pick it up, despite a glowing recommendation from Jennifer Ouellette, because NASCAR is one of the few things on ESPN that interests me less than baseball. I didn’t really think I’d be interested in reading a whole book on the subject. I saw Jennifer and Diandra on Bloggingheads… Continue reading The Physics of NASCAR by Diandra Leslie-Pelecky
Tell Me Something I Don’t Know
For reasons that don’t really matter, I learned yesterday that there is a marathon in Antarctica: On December 12th, 2009, the fifth Antarctic Ice Marathon will take place at 80 Degrees South, just a few hundred miles from the South Pole at the foot of the Ellsworth Mountains. This race presents a truly formidable and… Continue reading Tell Me Something I Don’t Know
Three Quarks Voting, X-Change Files
Two noteworthy things in the meta-blog category: 1) The 3 Quarks Daily science blogging prize nominations are up, and it’s a great list of sciencey bloggy goodness. If you’re looking for a way to procrastinate, you could kill several days reading all 171 entries. Once you’re done reading them, go vote for your favorite. The… Continue reading Three Quarks Voting, X-Change Files
Mysteries of the Stock Room
Why do we have two meter sticks taped together back to back? What is the dark stain obscuring the markings between 30 and 70 cm on half of the meter sticks? Where the hell are all the stopwatches? Why are the demo magnets sticky? Why do we still have six meters worth of a rusting,… Continue reading Mysteries of the Stock Room
Dorky Poll: Conservation
We’re having some technical difficulties on the ScienceBlogs back end, so this may be futile, but I’ve got a 9am lab class, so here’s a Dorky Poll in hopes that the comments will work well enough to be entertaining. Today’s lab is the “ballistic pendulum,” in which students use conservation of energy and conservation of… Continue reading Dorky Poll: Conservation
Three Quarks for Science Writing
I already mentioned this in a Links Dump, but there’s enough buzz that it’s probably worth a full post: the people at Three Quarks Daily have decided to offer prizes for blog writing: Starting next month, the prizes will be awarded every year on the two solstices and the two equinoxes. So, we will announce… Continue reading Three Quarks for Science Writing
Sigma Xi Talk: Tropical Glaciers Are Weird
Tuesday night was the annual Sigma Xi induction banquet on campus (I’m currently the president of the local chapter, and have been scrambling to organize the whole thing in between all my other responsibilities these past few weeks). Sigma Xi, for those not familiar with it, is the scientific research honor society– like Phi Beta… Continue reading Sigma Xi Talk: Tropical Glaciers Are Weird