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Author: Chad Orzel
Real Clock Tutorial: History
Over at A Blog Around the Clock, Bora put up a sixteen part series of posts talking about clocks. Unfortunately, he was talking about biological clocks, which are a specific and sort of messy application, from the standpoint of physics. I talk a bit about clocks for our first-year seminar class, as a part of… Continue reading Real Clock Tutorial: History
Mars and Venus in Grad School
It appears to be a good week for non-controversial posting, so while I’m making enemies, I might as well go all out… The recent call for book ideas from the Feminist Press has sparked an interesting discussion at Cocktail Party Physics, but I want to highlight one comment in particular: There is a lot more… Continue reading Mars and Venus in Grad School
Tim Powers, Three Days to Never [Library of Babel]
Tim Powers is one of those authors who has carved out a niche for himself telling a particular type of story, sort of like Guy Gavriel Kay with his pseudo-historical fantasy novels. In Powers’s case, the niche might be summarized as “supernatural secret history.” His best novels are set in something that’s more or less… Continue reading Tim Powers, Three Days to Never [Library of Babel]
Deep Thoughts from Pop Culture II
Here’s the other quote from Chuck Klosterman IV that I mentioned earlier, this one from an essay in Esquire on people who feel betrayed by pop culture: Do you want to be happy? I suspect that you do. Well, here’s the first step to happiness: don’t get pissed off that people who aren’t you happen… Continue reading Deep Thoughts from Pop Culture II
Deep Thoughts from Pop Culture
It feels a little silly to quote Chuck Klosterman as some sort of Deep Thinker– this is a guy whose whole claim to fame revolves around the expression of weirdly absolute opinions about pop culture ephemera, after all. Then again, the best political reporting being done these days is done by a pair of comedy… Continue reading Deep Thoughts from Pop Culture
Get Out the Vote in Ohio
Word has reached me[1] that, “me that the most notorious creationist on the Ohio State Board of Education, Deborah Owens Fink, has a challenger in the Novemeber 7th election.” For the politically inclined out there, some information: The challenger is former Ohio congressman Tom Sawyer. She is asking for help from the other Citizens for… Continue reading Get Out the Vote in Ohio
A Blog for Everything
Via a comment at Cocktail Party Physics, I have become aware of the existence of the “Physics Chicks” LiveJournal community. It’s probably safe to assume that the Female Science Professor isn’t wild about the name. It’s billed as “An online community for crazy and cool women in physics,” or at least those crazy and cool… Continue reading A Blog for Everything
Technical Difficulties
The Internet has been broken all afternoon at Chateau Steelypips, which is where there hasn’t been anything new psoted, and why it’s taken forever to approve a couple of comments that were held for moderation. Sorry about that. (I’m typing this from my office on campus– we turned Her Majesty’s evening walk into an email-checking… Continue reading Technical Difficulties
Hugo Awards 2006
This year’s Hugo Awards (either the Oscars of the Golden Globes of the science fiction/ fantasy field, depending on who you ask) were announced last night at the Worldcon in LA. Pleasant surprises abound: 1) Spin by Robert Charles Wilson won the Best Novel Hugo. As I’ve said before, I think it was far and… Continue reading Hugo Awards 2006