One of the perks of this semi-pro blogging gig is that people have started sending me free copies of books about physics. I’m halfway through a new book on quantum mechanics at the moment, and a copy of Lee Smolin’s forthcoming The Trouble With Physics is on its way. If you can’t wait to hear… Continue reading Know Your Gadfly Theorists
Author: Chad Orzel
Hot Topics and Controversies
The Dave Bacon post linked earlier today is actually the beginning of a plug for Doug Natelson’s list of hot topics and controversies in condensed matter and nanoscale science. As was suggested in a recent comment, now that a nonzero number of condensed matter and nano people are (apparently) reading this blog (at least occasionally),… Continue reading Hot Topics and Controversies
Pre-College Advising
We’re still a month away from the start of classes at most schools, but over at Learning Curves, Becky Hirta has some advice for new students. Some of this is university-specific (“Dress in layers. The University Center is never above 70 degrees; the math building is never below 80 degrees.”), and other bits are matters… Continue reading Pre-College Advising
Does This Happen to Anybody Else?
Quantum Pontiff Dave Bacon preaches the Word: One thing that bugs the heck out of me, is when I hear particle physicists talk about their field as if it is all of physics. I have a great love of particle physics, so I’m not dissing the field at all, nor arguing that it isn’t more… Continue reading Does This Happen to Anybody Else?
Internet Comic Repair Services
This is a few days old, now, but Truth and Beauty Bombs has done something I would’ve thought impossible: They’ve suggested a way to make Garfield amusing. Who woulda thunk it? It’s not as deeply and gloriously wrong as yesterday’s Medium Large, but it’s weirdly compelling. (Via a mailing list.)
Fun With Thermodynamics
Temperatures in Schenectady hit the mid-90’s yesterday (do your own metric conversions), so I took the opportunity to do a little experimental thermodynamics: I played pick-up soccer after work with some of the students who are here for the summer. On the field-turf football field, which was a good ten degrees hotter than the ambient… Continue reading Fun With Thermodynamics
Good News from Baghdad
Another email update from Senior Middle East Correspondant Paul Schemm, this time including some stuff that could be read as sort-of positive, if you’re a fan of the American presence in Iraq: The US soldiers obligingly stopped periodically during one patrol and allowed me to clamber out and talk to people. What they said surprised… Continue reading Good News from Baghdad
What Do Our Students Do After Graduation?
Continuing the recent “careers in science” theme, Inside Higher Ed has a story about what people with science degrees do with their lives, based on a new NSF report. From the Inside Higher Ed piece: Many science and engineering degree recipients continue to get use from their undergraduate studies even years after they’ve graduated, and… Continue reading What Do Our Students Do After Graduation?
You Are Not Lloyd Dobler
Over at Cocktail Party Physics, Jennifer Ouellette offers dating advice for the geek set. Mostly, this reminds me again how happy I am to be married, and not worrying about this stuff any more, but her advice seems reasonably sound, save for one point: There’s nothing sexier than a man who’s confident and comfortable in… Continue reading You Are Not Lloyd Dobler
What Is Our Students Learning?
The previous post reminded me of something I had marked as interesting: Technorati led me to ChemJerk, who pointed in turn to the Princton Review‘s list of Most Popular College Majors. In reverse order, with the top five below the fold, we have: 10) Political Science 9) Computer Science 8) Communications 7) English 6) Education