Kate and I went to see The Golden Compass last night because, dude, armored bears! Also, we both really enjoyed the book, back when it first came out (though I haven’t re-read it since The Amber Spyglass, to see if it was retroactively ruined by the third volume). From the opening titles in the left-over… Continue reading The Golden Compass
Month: December 2007
links for 2007-12-09
It Came Upon A Midnight Weird :: Cavalcade of Bad Nativities 2007 “The people who made this probably never even saw Star Wars, so they have no idea that they’ve just made a Jawa nativity. Sure, they’re adoring the child right now, but tomorrow, they’ll be out stealing droids again.” (tags: silly pictures religion)
Kip Thorne Interview
Poking around the Discover magazine web site looking for something else, I ran across this interview with Kip Thorne about black holes, wormholes, LIGO, and Stephen Hawking: It sounds like Hawking hasn’t done very well in his bets. He hasn’t won any of these bets yet. I think that characterizes the fact that he’s ready… Continue reading Kip Thorne Interview
Rawr!
One of the perks of being a B-list sciece blogger is that people send me stuff that they would like me to promote to my dozens of readers. Such as, for example, National Geographic’s very silly Dino Central Park site, where you can frighten simulated New Yorkers with simulated dinosaurs. Because… well, really, do you… Continue reading Rawr!
links for 2007-12-08
YouTube – Here Comes Another Bubble – The Richter Scales Web 2.0, to the tune of “We Didn’t Start the Fire” (tags: internet music silly video youtube) Jobs, News and Views for All of Higher Education – Inside Higher Ed :: Hope on Ph.D. Attrition Rates — Except in Humanities “Even after 10 years, a… Continue reading links for 2007-12-08
Defining “Miracles” Down
Over in LiveJournal land, Sherwood Smith links approvingly to an essay by Tom Simon in response to what are apparently some “logical positivist” evles in Christopher Paolini’s books. I haven’t read the books in question, but it really doesn’t matter, as Simon very quickly spins this off into a larger essay about the nature of… Continue reading Defining “Miracles” Down
How to Hand-Wave Quantum Phase?
Kind of a technical question, but typing it out might provide some inspiration, or failing that, somebody might have a good suggestion in the comments. Here’s the issue: I’m starting on a chapter about quantum teleportation for the book, and one of the key steps in the teleportation scheme is an entangling measurement of two… Continue reading How to Hand-Wave Quantum Phase?
Mortgage Crisis Question
Brad DeLong gives his stamp of approval to Steven Pearlstein’s explanation of the mortgage collapse now in progress. It is, indeed, a very clear explanation of what went wrong: Stick with me now, because this is where it gets interesting. For it is at this point that the banks got the bright idea of buying… Continue reading Mortgage Crisis Question
links for 2007-12-07
Cat Macros – Post a comment LOLCat weighs in on the Russian acquisition of LiveJournal. (tags: silly pictures blogs internet) Hey Spot, You’ve Got Mail – New York Times Dogster: because pets need social networks, too. (tags: dog silly internet society) The A.V. Club’s Third Annual Surprisingly Specific Holiday Gift Guide | The A.V. Club… Continue reading links for 2007-12-07
Smack Talking, Geek Style
John Scalzi is talking a big game: I was just taking one of those Internet tests to see how much of a geek I am, when I suddenly thought, what the fuck am I doing? I’m a published science fiction writer. Do not pass “go,” do not collect $200, you know? Just go straight to… Continue reading Smack Talking, Geek Style