n+1: Lions in Winter, Part One A very long and thorough history of the New York Public Library, how its current plans to gut the main research library came about, and what they mean for the idea of a public research library. Correcting the Record on College Graduates and Job Prospects by Joshua Tucker |… Continue reading Links for 2012-05-16
The Story of the Three Hippopotamuses
Tell me a story. Tell me the story about the three hippopotamuses. Ummm… OK. Once upon a time, there were three hipopotamuses. And they lived in Africa, in a river. Right, it was a great big long river, that had so much salt in it that they could float! Well, salt does help things float,… Continue reading The Story of the Three Hippopotamuses
Links for 2012-05-14
Surviving the World – Lesson 1395 – Arguing And, once again, the internet has been explained in under 20 words. If Publishing Is Dead, What Happens to Non-Fiction? « Maureen Ogle Consider: I started working on the meat book in early 2007. I finished it in early 2012. You do the math. I spent five… Continue reading Links for 2012-05-14
Transitional Technical Difficulties
As mentioned previously, the crack technical team at ScienceBlogs HQ is working on shifting us from our creaky Movable Type system to a shiny new WordPress system. Part of that process involves moving all the old posts over, which has been done… sort of. At present, any post since April 18 has not been moved,… Continue reading Transitional Technical Difficulties
Links for 2012-05-11
Next Time, Fail Better – Commentary – The Chronicle of Higher Education Humanities students should be more like computer-science students. I decided that as I sat in on a colleague’s computer-science course during the beginning of this, my last, semester in the classroom. I am moving into administration full time, and I figured that this… Continue reading Links for 2012-05-11
Genre Fiction and the Real Problem With Philosophy of Science
There’s been a bunch of discussion recently about philosophy of science and whether it adds anything to science. Most of this was prompted by Lawrence Krauss’s decision to become the Nth case study for “Why authors should never respond directly to bad reviews,” with some snide comments in an interview in response to a negative… Continue reading Genre Fiction and the Real Problem With Philosophy of Science
Links for 2012-05-10
A rare interview with former no. 1 overall pick Greg Oden about his injury-plagued career – Grantland He was just … Greg. For instance, as we were finishing our meal, three separate groups of fans approached him and asked for autographs and pictures. Like always, he granted their requests with an annoyed expression, didn’t say… Continue reading Links for 2012-05-10
Exploring Space: Don’t Sell Robots Short
One final thought on the Big Science/ Space Chronicles stuff from last week. One of the things I found really frustrating about the book, and the whole argument that we ought to be sinking lots of money into manned space missions is that the terms of the argument are so nebulous. This is most obvious… Continue reading Exploring Space: Don’t Sell Robots Short
Links for 2012-05-09
Confessions of a Community College Dean: Adjuncts on Food Stamps The general idea isn’t new, of course, but the numbers are. The story notes a threefold increase just from 2007 to 2010 in the number of people affected. I have to admit that my first response was “there but for the grace of God.” Anyone… Continue reading Links for 2012-05-09
The Crappy Science of Comic-Book Movies
I go back and forth about the whole question of scientific accuracy in tv shows and movies. On the one hand, I think that complaining “Explosions don’t make noise in space!” is one of the worst forms of humorless dorkitude, and I’m generally happy to let bad science slide by in the service of an… Continue reading The Crappy Science of Comic-Book Movies