Falsify Data, Go to Jail

The New York Times Magazine this week has a troubling story of scientific misconduct, involving the fraudulent research of Eric Poehlman: Before his fall from grace, Poehlman oversaw a lab where nearly a dozen students and postdoctoral researchers carried out his projects. His research earned him recognition among his peers and invitations to speak at… Continue reading Falsify Data, Go to Jail

Classic Edition: Hey, Ref!

Having made reference to the referee system in my post about a paper being accepted, this seems like a good point to dust off an old post about the peer review system in physics. Like many of the other Classic Edition posts I’ve put up here, this one dates from July of 2002. Apparently, I… Continue reading Classic Edition: Hey, Ref!

Virtual Labs

The New York Times today has a story about Web-based classes offering virtual labs, and whether they should count for AP credit: As part of a broader audit of the thousands of high school courses that display its Advanced Placement trademark, the [College Board] has recruited panels of university professors and experts in Internet-based learning… Continue reading Virtual Labs

Leaf Peeping

It’s fall, which means lots of good things: football on tv, college basketball just around the corner, apple cider donuts (mmm…. donuts…), and the leaves turning colors. One of the real highlights of living in New England is the spectacular foliage. Sadly, it tends to bring out the leaf-peepers, people from down toward New York… Continue reading Leaf Peeping

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College Choice

Sean Carroll is offering more unsolicted advice (though it is in response to a comment, which makes it borderline solicited…), this time about choosing an undergraduate school. He breaks the options down into four categories, with two small errors that I’ll correct in copying the list over here: Liberal-Arts College (LAC), such as Williams or… Continue reading College Choice

Bad Graphs

The silliest graph I’ve ever seen presented in public looked something like this: It was an after-dinner talk at a DAMOP meeting a few years back, and the speaker was somebody associated with the Hubble Space Telescope. I don’t recall what was being plotted, but he talked for a while about ho proud they were… Continue reading Bad Graphs