Over at The World’s Fair, David Ng is sorting his records autobiographically, and encouraging others to do the same: If you make a music mix that is a reflection of your informative years, what would those dozen or so songs be, and maybe more interesting, why? You don’t have to be proud of the song… Continue reading My Soundtrack, 1971-2002
The Grad School Application Process
I’m teaching our senior major seminar this term, which means that once a week, I’m giving hour-long talks on topics of interest to senior physics majors. This week’s was “How to Pick and Apply to a Graduate School.” I’ve probably written this basic stuff up about three times already, but I’m too lazy to look… Continue reading The Grad School Application Process
Meta-Contest: The Trouble With Physics
Through some quirk of the publishing industry, I find myself with two free copies of Lee Smolin’s The Trouble With Physics, one from my Corporate Masters at Seed, and the other direct from the publisher. This seems a little excessive, even for a confirmed bibliophile like myself. (I know, I know, this is a problem… Continue reading Meta-Contest: The Trouble With Physics
Do You Ever Miss the Days When You Used to Be Nostalgic?
Via Jo Walton, Russ Allbery has a wonderful piece on the glory that was Usenet: I’ve strongly disagreed with the idea that Usenet is dying. I still do, I think. I think things ebb and flow and shift around, but up until now I haven’t really thought about how my interaction with Usenet has changed,… Continue reading Do You Ever Miss the Days When You Used to Be Nostalgic?
Great Moments in Campus Signage
It’s that time of year when student groups try to get new members to sign up, leading to all manner of interesting signs around campus. One of my favorites:
No God Left Behind
Over at Inside Higher Ed, William Durden resorts to satire in response to the Spellings commission report: In the nation’s current zeal to account for all transfer of teaching and insight through quantitative, standardized testing, perhaps we should advance quantitative measurement into other areas of human meaning and definition. Why leave work undone? I suggest,… Continue reading No God Left Behind
Blogger SAT Challenge Revealed!
So, the Blogger SAT Challenge has officially run its course, and Dave has posted the question to Cognitive Daily. I’ll reproduce it below the fold, and make some general comments. What were the results like? We had 500 people at least look at the survey question, and Dave gives the breakdown: The survey required participants… Continue reading Blogger SAT Challenge Revealed!
Baghdad Update: Rust and Paint
Senior Middle East Correspondant Paul Schemm checks in with another email update from Baghdad, this time describing a visit to a tank graveyard. ———————– It was a graveyard. That was the only way to describe it. The place where old war machines came to die. Row upon row of massive sand-colored metal tanks, their huge… Continue reading Baghdad Update: Rust and Paint
Classic Edition: Wanted: Fewer Pundit Blogs
One of the bloggers quoted in Simon Owens’s demographics post states flat-out that “I basically don’t give a crap about the non-political blogosphere.” I found this interesting, because I used to read almost exclusively political blogs, but my opinion has shifted to be almost exactly the opposite of this: I really find it hard to… Continue reading Classic Edition: Wanted: Fewer Pundit Blogs
Free the Tripoli Six
Five Bulgarian nurses and a Palestinian doctor are currently facing execution in Libya, charged with deliberately infrecting some 400 children with AIDS. An independent scientific study of the matter found that most of the children were infected well before the “Tripoli Six” even entered the country, but the study was dismissed by the court. The… Continue reading Free the Tripoli Six