tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-87331156362606456222024-02-20T01:52:40.877-08:00The Culture ChemistHandyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09215237028041216312noreply@blogger.comBlogger40125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8733115636260645622.post-52909471486120950092013-02-27T20:06:00.001-08:002013-02-27T20:07:39.855-08:00Galactical Inquirer<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://sphotos-b.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ash3/577014_467510309936652_1337287033_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://sphotos-b.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ash3/577014_467510309936652_1337287033_n.jpg" width="243" /></a></div>
<br />Handyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09215237028041216312noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8733115636260645622.post-29758400776985414452012-08-07T09:12:00.003-07:002012-08-07T09:12:34.228-07:00Message ReceivedAs of last night, we have received confirmation that Curiosity, NASA's latest Mars rover, has landed and will begin its two-year mission to find the building blocks of life. For more on the Curiousity's scientific mission, see the <a href="http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/msl/mission/science/" target="_blank">Jet Propulsion Laboratory's site</a>.<br />
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The following animation illustrating Curiosity's landing sequence is a must-see. Videos like this, with the ability to awe, inspire and induce a public conversation about science, should be a requirement for major science projects from here on.<br />
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<iframe allowfullscreen='allowfullscreen' webkitallowfullscreen='webkitallowfullscreen' mozallowfullscreen='mozallowfullscreen' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/P4boyXQuUIw?feature=player_embedded' frameborder='0'></iframe></div>
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Alternatively, with commentary<br />
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<iframe allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen" frameborder="0" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/a4YqNoLkmxE" width="560"></iframe><br />
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And lastly, follow the link to a haunting (and fictional) short film about a previous Mars mission, the Sojourner and Pathfinder. Packed into this magnificent film is a humanizing look at robots and the difficulties in explaining science to the public - both in translation and the media's self-imposed restrictions on content. This film, "No Message Received", is part of Orbit(film), a series of independent short films each inspired by one of the features of our Solar System.<br />
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<a href="http://vimeo.com/18778774">http://vimeo.com/18778774</a><br />
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<br />Handyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09215237028041216312noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8733115636260645622.post-72541369526790259172012-07-26T08:51:00.000-07:002012-07-26T08:51:24.320-07:00Pic of the Day<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://i.imgur.com/NchtU.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://i.imgur.com/NchtU.jpg" width="239" /></a></div>
<br />Handyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09215237028041216312noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8733115636260645622.post-78255025394051065912012-07-10T22:38:00.003-07:002013-02-27T20:05:15.893-08:00The four things you'll read about the Higgs BosonThe media has been abuzz with the announcement that both the ATLAS and CMS experiments have found a particle with an energy of 1.25 giga electron-volts, presumed to be the Higgs Boson. In the aftermath of this announcement, there have emerged certain trends; almost all the articles will tell you one or more of the following things:<br />
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1. What the Higgs Boson and <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Higgs_mechanism" target="_blank">Higgs Mechanism</a> is.</div>
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I recently had a beer with my grandma, and as grandmas are wont to do, she had clipped an article about the Higgs boson out of a newspaper and wanted me to explain to her what it meant. The best explanation I could come up with is to liken it to another boson, the photon. Within the electromagnetic field - a permeating field, like the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Introduction_to_the_Higgs_field" target="_blank">Higgs field</a> - there can be oscillations. Visible light is such an oscillation, since it can be thought of as an electromagnetic wave. As many people now know, light can also be thought of as a particle, the photon. The photon is simply the particle manifestation of this oscillation within the electromagnetic field. Photons, obviously, have no mass. This analogy was not shot down when I discussed the Higgs discovery with the <a href="http://uw.physics.wisc.edu/~joynt/" target="_blank">Chair of the Physics Department at the University of Wisconsin</a>, so it's what I've continued to go with. </div>
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To explain how the Higgs field interacts, or couples, with other forces and impart mass, a discussion with someone who had also read about the discovery yielded this interesting description: Imagine a party, where you don't know anybody. You can walk through the scene and attract almost no attention. However, if Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie were to walk through, the partygoers would certainly give them attention. Thus, different particles (you, Brangelina) passing through the Higgs field (the party) are given different amounts of mass (attention). I wasn't given the source, so I can't credit it, but that seemed to be an apt analogy, especially for this blog. </div>
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2. That the Higgs Boson is a huge victory for particle physics and the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_Model" target="_blank">standard model</a>.</div>
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Which it is. It is also an incredible victory for the scientific process: there is a problem where results don't match explanation, a new explanation is proposed, an experiment is created to test the hypothesis, and results are compared to the hypothesis. In this case, it was a resounding, if expensive, success.</div>
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3. That the Higgs Boson represents a disappointment for the physics community.</div>
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For an example, see The Atlantic article "<a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2012/07/why-the-higgs-boson-discovery-is-disappointing-according-to-the-smartest-man-in-the-world/259468/" target="_blank">Why the Higg's Boson is a disappointment according to the smartest man in the world</a>".</div>
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For scientists, nothing is more exciting than the unknown. Sure, it's great to have your ideas validated, but real science happens when you get something that you didn't expect. This is how scientific paradigms are started and ended; on a philosophical level, it's not that this is how science "advances", but rather you get to try and explain new phenomena, increasing understanding of what is already known. </div>
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To interpret finding the Higgs Boson as a disappointment is grossly premature. The <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lhc" target="_blank">Large Hadron Collider</a> has not yet run at its maximum designed energy, so there may be many quirks of quarks to be found when it does. To state that there is nothing to be gained from this episode is silly.</div>
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4. That the Higgs Boson, and more, could have been discovered in America, a decade ago. </div>
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In the late 80s, the US Congress approved the Superconducting Super Collider (SSC), a giant particle accelerator to be built in Texas, that would be able to reach energies almost twice what the LHC can. However, due to a number of factors, mostly political, the project was killed in 1993. </div>
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Some of this discussion may seem like whiny jingoism, but it gets at a deeper point: in the last two decades, the United States has greatly reduced its commitment to basic science.</div>
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For more information about the SSC, read Daniel Kevles's <a href="http://www.jstor.org/discover/10.2307/27757780?uid=3739976&uid=2129&uid=2&uid=70&uid=4&uid=3739256&sid=56301506253" target="_blank">magnificent piece</a> on the fate of two American Big Science projects - the SSC and the Human Genome Project - in the early 1990s (JSTOR access required). </div>
Handyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09215237028041216312noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8733115636260645622.post-65588738182562786692012-06-25T16:13:00.000-07:002012-06-25T16:13:15.680-07:00GZA and Neil DeGrasse Tyson team upIn the past I've blogged about the relatively weak, but existent, link between popular music and science. The Wall Street Journal has an interesting <a href="http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702303640104577436392955009490.html?mod=WSJ_NY_LEFTSecondStories" target="_blank">article</a> about a legendary rapper's attempt to reconcile the two, in two forthcoming albums. Will GZA, formerly of the Wu-Tang Clan, be able to mine science for silver, gold, or platinum? Will it fall mostly on uninterested ears? Will he be able to create something fitting the scope of "the Universe"? Like a good scientist, GZA seems to be asking the right questions, enlisting the proper collaborators for <i>Dark Matter</i>, due out this fall.<br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Composer and producer Marco Vitali, a Juilliard-trained violinist, is helping to score "Dark Matter." He recalled a recent meeting in which GZA explained the images that the music should convey.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">"We talked about frenetic energy, outer space, molecules crashing into each other, organized chaos," Mr. Vitali said. "The grandeur of the fact that the universe was born in a millionth of a second, in this explosion that created billions of stars, these overpowering ideas that are bigger than we can conceive. How do we make the record feel like that?"</span></div>
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I find it illuminating that a high school dropout has, years later, embraced a curiosity for science. According to the article, the project was born out of an experience with a model of Saturn at the American Museum of Natural History; a simple rhyme begets a multi-album project.<span style="background-color: white;"> Hopefully his lyricism and NDT's capacity to elucidate the cosmos are able to create an album worthy of the subject. Either way, he deserves credit for tackling subjects that most most artists can't, or won't. </span>Handyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09215237028041216312noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8733115636260645622.post-66404342160902247822012-06-21T11:12:00.000-07:002013-02-27T20:05:48.638-08:00Behind the "Most Astounding Fact"In March of 2012, a video about science went viral: Neil DeGrasse Tyson (obviously) shares the "Most Astounding Fact" - that all the atoms in our bodies are made in the end stages of stars - accompanied by a stirring soundtrack and a montage of images showing humans and the heavens. Though it may not have been the first scientifically themed viral video, it took me by surprise. Considering the interview was several years old, were the music and pictures what NDT needed to be a YouTube sensation? Maybe, but the end result is no less moving. If you haven't seen it yet, watch it here before continuing:<br />
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Never mind that a least a few atoms of carbon from the carbon dioxide of Hitler's last breath are also in each of us, the sentiment that "we are all stardust" resonates with people. As Tyson says, it helps us - tiny humans on a pale blue dot - place ourselves in the universe. The idea is relatively well-known; even Moby incorporated it in his song "We Are All Made of Stars". But where did this idea come from ? (Hint: it's not the Bible)<br />
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The "most astounding fact" is just the face of unsung science that Tyson has spent effort to inform the public about. <a href="http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/mateq/i_am_neil_degrasse_tyson_ama/c2zg3uw" target="_blank">Elsewhere</a>, Tyson has suggested that everyone should know the names <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Margaret_Burbidge" target="_blank">Margaret Burbidge</a>, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geoffrey_Burbidge" target="_blank">Geoffrey Burbidge</a>, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Alfred_Fowler" target="_blank">Willie Fowler</a>, and <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fred_Hoyle" target="_blank">Fred Hoyle</a>, the authors of the paper that showed how all the elements needed to make us are themselves made in stellar cores, a paper so famous, it simply is known by the names of it's authors: <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B2FH_paper" target="_blank">B<sup>2</sup>FH</a>. Sadly, most people do not know these names. Part of it is general ignorance of science and scientists, part of it because of Fred Hoyle, last on the paper alphabetically, though first in importance to 20th Century astrophysics. This post is meant to help those whose curiosity was piqued by the video get a deeper understanding of the science and scientists that helped us come to the understanding we have about the origins of the elements that make us. We will get to Hoyle later, first we get to ask, "what is nucleosynthesis?"<br />
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<b>Nucleosynthesis</b><br />
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Being about 70% water, humans are comprised mostly of hydrogen atoms. <span style="background-color: white;">But we obviously have many other, heavier, elements in us: calcium, potassium, zinc, iron. In a universe where the vast majority of the atoms are hydrogen or helium, the lightest of elements, we have to ask where the heavier ones came from. Big Bang cosmology allows for the creation of Hydrogen and some Helium, but the Universe would have cooled too quickly to allow the formation of anything heavier. So, where did they come from? Stars have always been the prime candidate </span><span style="background-color: white;">in the Big Bang paradigm </span><span style="background-color: white;">to produce the rest of the periodic table, since we've known for years that they 1) are hot enough to provide the energies necessary for the fusion of elements and 2) their spectra show that their chemical compositions include trace amounts of metals.</span><br />
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Though fusion reactions are not quite as simple as adding atomic numbers to get new elements, where A+B=C or even A+A=B, it will suffice to say that elements are formed in collisions, where some atoms must combine with either other atoms or fundamental particles to form a new element. Elements, then, are formed in stages, where some cannot be made until others have already been created. Even the most primary stellar fusion reaction, the transformation of hydrogen into helium, must go through the complex <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proton-proton_chain" target="_blank">proton-proton chain</a>.<br />
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But in the 1950's, scientists were puzzled; they couldn't come up with the right equations that led to the formation of key elements, particularly carbon, that would match the frequency with which we find them in the universe.<br />
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<b>Why you haven't heard of Fred Hoyle</b><br />
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Fred Hoyle, a British astrophysicist at Cambridge, finally found the missing piece: a new "resonance", or state, for carbon that would allow it to be made in stars in sufficient quantities to explain the abundance of carbon found on Earth. Actually, he predicted it - by reasoning that humans are made from carbon, so there must be a way to create it - and other scientists found it, exactly as Hoyle had described. This new form of carbon was created by having three <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alpha_particle" target="_blank">alpha-particles</a> combine, rather than, say, two lithium atoms or an alpha particle and a beryllium atom.<br />
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With the formation of carbon now explained, Hoyle and his colleagues went on to write the B<sup>2</sup>FH paper, the keystone of the field of Nucleosynthesis. Their paper was able to account for the creation of all the elements necessary to sustain life on earth, from carbon on up. It was truly a monumental achievement. As Simon Mitton writes in <u>Fred Hoyle: A Life in Science:</u><br />
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The four decided to publish their work as a single encyclopaedic paper, 108 pages in extent [...] They could have produced a series of shorter papers instead [...] had they done so, their work would have lost much of its magisterial quality and would have had less impact. B2FH remains a key paper. It defined the landscape for nuclear astrophysics, establishing a grammar and a lexicon, and providing (sic) an arithmetic and an algebra. (218)</blockquote>
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But it was only Fowler who received the 1983 Nobel Prize in Physics for <span style="font-family: inherit;">"<span style="background-color: white; line-height: 19px;">his theoretical and experimental studies of the nuclear reactions of importance in the formation of the chemical elements in the universe." </span></span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: inherit; line-height: 19px;">So why wasn't Hoyle, the godfather of stellar nucleosynthesis, included in the award? Nobel prizes can be shared by at most three people, but the 1983 prize was only given to two - Fowler and </span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subramanyan_Chandrasekhar" style="background-color: white; font-family: inherit; line-height: 19px;" target="_blank">Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar</a><span style="background-color: white; font-family: inherit; line-height: 19px;"> - so that wasn't the reason. Though nobody knows for sure, it probably had to do with the fact that in addition to being a brilliant scientist, Hoyle was also an obdurate, iconoclastic, stubborn man, whose disagreements with others became legendary both for their intensity and their duration. </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; font-family: inherit; line-height: 19px;">In 1974, Hoyle criticized the decision to award the Nobel to </span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthony_Hewish" style="background-color: white; font-family: inherit; line-height: 19px;" target="_blank">Anthony Hewish</a><span style="background-color: white; font-family: inherit; line-height: 19px;"> for discovering pulsars, when it was his student, </span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jocelyn_Bell" style="background-color: white; font-family: inherit; line-height: 19px;" target="_blank">Jocelyn Bell</a><span style="background-color: white; font-family: inherit; line-height: 19px;">, who first noticed them. The 1974 prize was also split between Hewish and British radioastronomer </span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_Ryle" style="background-color: white; font-family: inherit; line-height: 19px;" target="_blank">Martin Ryle</a><span style="background-color: white; font-family: inherit; line-height: 19px;"> - chief among Hoyle's rivals. </span><span style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="line-height: 19px;">Beyond the 1974 Nobel dispute, which was a public </span></span><span style="line-height: 19px;">embarrassment</span><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="line-height: 19px;"> for him, Hoyle often clung to ideas long after the consensus had abandoned it, often in the face of overwhelming evidence. He never, even until his death, completely accepted the big bang cosmology, favoring instead a "</span></span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steady_state_theory" style="font-family: inherit; line-height: 19px;" target="_blank">steady-state</a><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="line-height: 19px;">" universe, though ironically it was Hoyle who derisively coined the term "big bang". Hoyle also published works alleging that the fossil </span></span><i style="font-family: inherit; line-height: 19px;">archaeopteryx</i><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="line-height: 19px;"> was a hoax. Scientists, alas, are no less immune </span></span></span><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 19px;">to politics and favor</span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: inherit; line-height: 19px;"> than the rest of us. </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="line-height: 19px;"><b>What it all means</b></span></span></span><br />
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<span style="line-height: 19px;">We live in an complex and evolving universe. Nucleosynthesis is just a link in the chain of ideas that we can draw from ourselves to the fundamental constants of physics. From those constants comes the ability for nuclei and atoms to form; for disparate atoms to condense into stars under the force of gravity; for elements to be forged in the centers of stars; for those elements to be redistributed into the interstellar medium; and for new stars and planets to coalesce from that medium, rich with the elements necessary to sustain life.</span><br />
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<span style="line-height: 19px;">Because I cannot say it better than Neil DeGrasse Tyson, I'll paraphrase him: we are part of the universe and the universe is a part of us.</span><br />
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<span style="line-height: 19px;">Enjoy yourself some Moby!</span><br />
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<span style="line-height: 19px;"><br /></span>Handyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09215237028041216312noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8733115636260645622.post-68704913619113559692012-06-06T15:36:00.001-07:002012-06-06T15:36:44.221-07:00Science Denial: The Denialist's PlaybookSean Carroll, evolutionary biologist at the University of Wisconsin and VP of Science Education at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, provides this interesting list of tactics used by denialists everywhere. His specific example in his keynote talk at Science Denial conference was with chiropractors and their past and present denial of the efficacy of the polio vaccine, but coming up with examples of the exact same strategies that other causes have used is not difficult. Whether through organization or due to some underlying psychology the playbook gets used over and over. As Carroll said, "we have all been here before." In general order, the denialist, in the face of evidence to the contrary, will:<br />
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<li>Doubt the Science.</li>
<li>Question the Scientists' Motive(s) and Integrity.</li>
<li>Magnify legitimate disagreements among scientists and cite "gadflies" as authorities. </li>
<li>Exaggerate potential harm.</li>
<li>Appeal to personal freedom.</li>
<li>Repudiate on the basis of a key philosophy or ideology.</li>
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What quickly becomes apparent, after reaching the sixth strategy, is that the other five are simply smokescreens. Most true denialists are not interested in the facts (a major theme of the conference). But in all cases of denial, even where people seem to be well-meaning, the scientific evidence is in direct contradiction to an understanding of how the World works. I will get into the cognitive process - motivated reasoning - that leads to using the first five plays in another post.<br />
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How does one get around this and change the internal narrative in an individual? This of course is the holy grail of impactful writing and if anybody really knew, the world would look a lot different.Handyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09215237028041216312noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8733115636260645622.post-85230252137757430512012-06-06T15:36:00.000-07:002012-06-06T15:36:17.910-07:00Lexical dark matterHere's an interesting <a href="http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/06/04/using-undictionaried-words/?src=un&feedurl=http%3A%2F%2Fjson8.nytimes.com%2Fpages%2Fopinion%2Findex.jsonp" target="_blank">read from the New York Times about diction and dictionaries</a>.<br />
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My favorite part about the article is the "dark matter" analogy the author uses to describe words that exist but aren't codified in our compendia of words. I love the use of a scientific analogy to help explain the humanities; it is my own opinion that the aloofness to science that some scholars in the humanities pride themselves on blinds them to some interesting concepts, such as this lexical dark matter. At the very least the analogy works perfectly for the article.<br />
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The other interesting approach in the article, which has been used in numerous sciences - from astrobiology to nucleosynthesis - is the spin of the "anthropic principle", what might in this case be called the lexical principle: that creating a word is all that is necessary to make it a word, though whether anyone else can grasp the meaning of it is another matter.<br />
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Perhaps we really have been too hard on George W. Bush and Sarah Palin, after all; perhaps they were true lexical pioneers, rather than mumbumbling, malapropical fools.<br />
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<br />Handyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09215237028041216312noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8733115636260645622.post-26390262207657269322012-05-02T12:51:00.000-07:002012-05-02T12:53:44.290-07:00The Decades, by sci-fi themesAt the Science Writing in an Age of Denial conference, one of the opening speakers was David Krakauer, director of the Wisconsin Institutes for Discovery. I forget the greater point of his brief talk, but he discusses what, in his view, were the major themes of science fiction movies in each of the decades since World War II. Here is his list, discuss:<br />
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50's - Nuclear fallout/winter. Easy to explain in the wake of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.<br />
60's - Evolutionary disaster. Think Planet of the Apes and Godzilla.<br />
70's - Human caused disasters, such as epidemics.<br />
80's - Human evil in the aftermath of the apocalypse (think Mad Max)<br />
90s' - The Michael Crichton era. Jurassic Park, enough said. This one made me laugh.<br />
00's - rehashes of all the previous decades, but with prettier special effects.<br />
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My only problem is that this analysis is that it omits an important period from about 1995-2005, where non-anthropogenic, physical catastrophe ruled Hollywood sci-fi. This may just be the period when I first became really conscious of movies, but films like Armageddon, Deep Impact, Dante's Peak, Volcano, The Core, and The Day After Tomorrow all came out in this time period.<br />
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Going deeper, I wonder if these films were popular because of a wishful thinking that human beings won't be the end of themselves - it will have to be a volcano or comet that ends humanity, rather than nuclear winter, or global warming, which The Day After Tomorrow finally addressed.Handyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09215237028041216312noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8733115636260645622.post-24749468573014713332012-05-02T12:09:00.001-07:002012-05-02T12:09:25.450-07:00IntroductoryLast week, I had the chance to attend the Science Writing in an Age of Denial conference at the University of Wisconsin. Mostly for writers, it also included an assortment of scholars both in scientific disciplines and peripheral fields such as history of science and science communications. As the title of the event implies, much of the conference was about the public and organized denial of scientific evidence, most notably evolution and climate change. These were two areas in which I felt reasonably comfortable, so it was the other subjects that faced denial - such as cancer screenings and the denial about their (lack of) effectiveness, which were most interesting to me. While the title of the conference related to the denial of science, an appropriate subtitle could have been "and the science of denial," specifically the psychology and even neuroscience behind denial and the strategies one could use when trying to address the deniers (or even undecided people, in the context of denial).<br />
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The conference was fascinating, not only because of the keynote presentations, but because of the dynamics between conference goers. There were both outspoken "new" media personalities as well as old school, reserved, establishment journalists. There were a few crackpots who came out of the woodwork to monopolize Q and A sessions with rambling "questions" that were little more than vehicles for their exaggerated views on science and society. There were some very accomplished writers as well as people like me who, though active in conversations, mostly just sat back and observed.<br />
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Some discussions could verge on depressing; we must constantly face a very well organized and well funded opposition, barriers that the human brain can throw up in the face of reason, and challenges in organizing our own thoughts in light of these obstacles. But it was heartening to see that some very smart people were willing to at least confront this problem head on. <br />
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I definitely was able to get a lot of fodder for this blog over the two days. The experience also boosted my confidence in my decision to make a career out of science writing. I've tried to distill what I got out of the conference in order to post it here, rather than incessantly tweet with my face in my laptop, like many of the other attendees, putting the gem quotes in context rather than leave them stranded out in the sea of chatter about Metta World Peace and whatever else people tweet about. (This was revealing, as all these new media platforms seem to be increasingly important to science writers. Maybe it's just that the other journalists and their editors old and don't really understand how to use them, but the effectiveness of twitter at the conference was limited at best).Handyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09215237028041216312noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8733115636260645622.post-92147073093532964732012-05-02T12:07:00.002-07:002012-05-02T12:07:55.232-07:00Phases of VenusSweet band name alert, but also the subject of a sweet astronomy photo. Recently there was both a crescent venus and crescent moon in the same area of sky and NASA was able to provide us with this picture:<br />
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<br />Handyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09215237028041216312noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8733115636260645622.post-31144243984628972172012-04-22T21:29:00.000-07:002012-04-22T21:29:57.152-07:00Newton's SwingsetWe all remember Newton's cradle, that set of balls that exhibit laws of momentum. While cool, the novelty wore off after you figured out that there were only about a dozen different ways to make the balls smack back and forth.<br />
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But here we have a set of balls that, when put in motion, get interesting fast and stay interesting for a while.<br />
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<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/u6dTB4AqBmk" width="420"></iframe>Handyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09215237028041216312noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8733115636260645622.post-34077670229820135862012-04-20T09:53:00.003-07:002012-04-20T09:53:55.267-07:00Watch the wrench<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://www.toonhole.com/comics/2010-10-11-032_SpaceHighFive.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://www.toonhole.com/comics/2010-10-11-032_SpaceHighFive.jpg" width="253" /></a></div>
<br />Handyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09215237028041216312noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8733115636260645622.post-32761469929548161492012-04-14T17:54:00.002-07:002012-04-14T17:54:41.537-07:00Taking the Fourier Transform of... the Beatles?<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
Of all the concepts I learned in my undergraduate math and physics courses that I no longer have any grasp on today, Fourier series and transforms may be the biggest lacuna. I remember one of my professors explaining that Fourier was just trying to explain heat transfer and assumed his equations would work, but that it took Mathematicians decades to prove that they indeed do. I also remember that Fourier series are insanely useful; enter today's article, which is exhibit 809 in the usefulness of Fourier series. A mathematician used Fourier analysis to figure out what goes into the opening chord of "A Hard Day's Night." Since Beatles music is tightly controlled on the internet, I wasn't expecting to be able to post what the opening chord actually sounds like, since any cover wouldn't actually have it as it was played on the recording, since nobody knew what it was. There's a pretty good tautology for you. But it looks like some enterprising youtuber found a way to post a video containing the music. Enjoy.</div>
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<br /><iframe allowfullscreen='allowfullscreen' webkitallowfullscreen='webkitallowfullscreen' mozallowfullscreen='mozallowfullscreen' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/zSm0M-BbVdY?feature=player_embedded' frameborder='0'></iframe></div>
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The chord and mathematician are discussed here:</div>
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<a href="http://www.noiseaddicts.com/2008/11/beatles-hard-days-night-mystery-chord-solved/" style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.917969); color: #1155cc; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; font-weight: normal; text-align: -webkit-auto;" target="_blank">http://www.noiseaddicts.com/<wbr></wbr>2008/11/beatles-hard-days-<wbr></wbr>night-mystery-chord-solved/</a></h3>
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<a href="http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/fourier.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="231" src="http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/fourier.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />Handyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09215237028041216312noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8733115636260645622.post-90174210665091177172012-04-13T13:29:00.001-07:002012-04-13T13:29:32.734-07:00This is your brain as art<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
A cool sculpture: a resin cast of all the blood vessels in the human brain. On display at the Wellcome Collection in London, England</div>
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<br />Handyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09215237028041216312noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8733115636260645622.post-52548356852154404652011-02-12T10:49:00.000-08:002011-02-12T10:57:15.570-08:00War as Art, and ScienceA new exhibit in Dublin is pitting white blood cells from different people against each other in a tournament style fight to the death. All in the name of Science! And since the cells will be dyed different colors for identification we can call it art too.<br /><br />But dismissing it so easiliy would be doing the gallery a disservice; this is one part of many, including books made of flesh and bit of performance art, where scientists work on new project - in full view of gallery spectators.<br /><br />Check it out <a href="http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2011-02/09/blood-wars-art-science-exhibition">here </a>or at it's <a href="http://www.sciencegallery.com/visceral">homepage</a>.Handyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09215237028041216312noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8733115636260645622.post-57910945727709658022010-11-30T21:00:00.000-08:002010-11-30T21:20:30.036-08:00Biological ArtIt seems the New York Times has been killing it lately with features about biological research that is doubling as fine art. A few weeks ago they had an amazing <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/16/science/16animate.html?scp=1&sq=animation&st=cse">article</a> and video <iframe width="480" height="373" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" marginheight="0" marginwidth="0" id="nyt_video_player" title="New York Times Video - Embed Player" src="http://graphics8.nytimes.com/bcvideo/1.0/iframe/embed.html?videoId=1248069334032&playerType=embed"></iframe> feature on biological animators, who use state of the art computer graphics to help us see the minute processes that sustain life. Proteins folding, RNA at work, the animations are truly inspired work.<br /><br />Then this week they have a <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/slideshow/2010/11/29/science/20101130-brain.html?ref=science">slide show</a> of images of the brain, from a coffeetable book by Carl Schoonover, a PhD candidate in neuroscience.<br /><br />I was about to comment on how it seems as though Scientists have a much greater appreciation for art than the other way around; more than once I've heard scientists (or science-types) lament that many artists wear their ignorance of scientific knowledge as a badge of pride whereas many scientists also have an interest in the fine arts. However, I have quickly realized this must be a false dichotomy. Especially in these cases, we have Scientific Artists, or Artistic Scientists. A college professor of mine, David Ehrlich, would always hold a series of panel discussions every year where a group of scientists would discuss ways that "creative" approaches helped them in their research and where a group of artists would discuss ways that "scientific" thinking helped them in their projects.Handyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09215237028041216312noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8733115636260645622.post-42836026542365363372010-11-30T20:44:00.000-08:002010-11-30T21:00:26.479-08:00Tomorrow's newsNASA has announce that at 2 PM on Thursday, December 2, it will hold an news conference "to discuss an astrobiology finding that will impact the search for evidence of extraterrestrial life." So far, no major news outlets have picked up on this. I myself only found out about this trawling the dregs of the internet for science related scraps. What will NASA's finding be? The Website <a href="http://www.dailygalaxy.com/my_weblog/2010/11/page-one-story-of-the-century-nasa-may-announce-thursday-to-have-found-life-on-saturns-moon-titan.html#more">Daily Galaxy</a> thinks that the announcement will have something to do with Titan, the moon of Saturn that is known to be covered in a methane sea.<br /><br />Ironically, NASA's attempt at generating interest in their announcement seems to be superseded by a group using a similar tactic: WikiLeaks. The diplomatic cables that WikiLeaks release is just about all anybody is talking about this week, though NASA's announcement is hopefully equally revealing. My personal guess is that , like the WikiLeaks document dump, it will contain important information, but will be ultimately ignored by the majority of the world. Based on the Daily Galaxy's prognostication, the best we can hope for is an announcement that some sort of bacteria-like organism is living in the Methane of Titan. While this is certainly important, it seems that at this point a lot of people seem to believe that finding evidence of life elsewhere in the Universe is an inevitability. Perhaps the fact that it likely exists in our own Solar System would be the biggest shock.<br /><br />Again, this is all speculation, we'll have to see what NASA has to say on Thursday.Handyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09215237028041216312noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8733115636260645622.post-25438064688329702702010-10-21T20:49:00.000-07:002010-10-21T21:51:40.888-07:00They Might Be Giants Have something to say to Bad Religionhttp://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=darwin-was-a-punk<br /><br />http://www.indierockcafe.com/mp3s/2010/summix5/summermix/19%20Why%20Does%20The%20Sun%20Shine_%20(The%20Sun.mp3<br /><br />This isn't even the best version, couldn't easily figure out how to upload an MP3. But sadly, I somewhat agree with the comment that there aren't any great songs about Science. The top five songs that come close though:<br /><br /><br />5) "We are all Made of Stars" by Moby<br /> Unless we are living in a computer simulation, this is undeniably true and haunting to think about. I dare you to not end up contemplating your own mortality when you hear this song.<br />4) "Three is a Magic Number" by School House Rock<br /> Not really science, but Math comes close when you're talking about lack of great songs.<br />3)" '39" by Queen. Brian May, Queen's guitarist is an PhD Astrophysicist, which means this is undoubtedly about time dilation. Silly people and their other theories about what it means.<br />2) "I Am A Scientist" by Guided By Voices. I am a Scientist/I seek to understand. Enough said. This is probably the only song about Science with a captial S. And it does it in only one line!<br />1) "Modern Major General"/"The Elements", lyrics music and lyrics by Gilbert and Sullivan and lyrics by Tom Leher. Alone, they are good, but together they are great.<br /><br /><br />Of course, now I feel obligated to bring up the most Unscientific songs of all time. In my opinion this list pretty much starts and ends with Insane Clown Posse's "Miracles". Check out the <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_-agl0pOQfs">video</a>, as well as the <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FGbdomlBnJM">SNL parody of it.</a>Handyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09215237028041216312noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8733115636260645622.post-78670642561873546172010-09-12T21:00:00.001-07:002010-09-12T21:07:23.582-07:00U.S. Law is ill equipped to handle science, Part IIA few weeks ago, I posted an article about how the U.S. Legal system was affecting scientific research. <a href="http://genome.fieldofscience.com/2010/09/stem-cell-heroes-and-villains.html">Here</a> is an equally disturbing article about a legal challenge to President Obama's ruling that allowed research on embryonic stem cell research to resume.Handyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09215237028041216312noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8733115636260645622.post-73739769885239997742010-08-28T10:29:00.000-07:002012-08-28T10:01:03.828-07:00Turn off your phone; Turn off your brain (in a good way)<a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/25/technology/25brain.html?pagewanted=1&ref=homepage&src=me">http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/25/technology/25brain.html?pagewanted=1&ref=homepage&src=me</a><br />
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An early skirmish in the upcoming battle between neuroScience and Technology: constant occupation with electronic media is affecting our brains' ability to process information.<br />
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There is a great Radiolab segment which illustrates the basic bit of science behind this article: your brain needs time to process new information and it does so by basically re-running the experience in downtime, mostly sleep but probably other times when it isn't engaged. Pretty sure it's somewhere in the episode "Sleep." Where as a computer can take information and store it straight to the hard drive, the Brain basically stores it in a buffer where it must go through processing and reprocessing in order to be store with any sense of permanency. Now, smartphones and the ubiquity of LCD screens with Fox News or TLC or other garbage have led us to develop habits that hamper the brains ability to go into this processing mode.<br />
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The article claims that this constant occupation with stimuli is even going so far as to make us more tired. The subjects who provide quotes for the articles are the classic rats in the lab who shock themselves silly with pleasure, even at the expense of food and water, but with a twist: their quotes show them as completely aware of what they are doing - says one subject, "It’s become a demand [...] a demand of my head, I told my girlfriend that I’m more tired since I got this [Blackberry].” People are now willing to submit themselves to constant electronic stimulation - by way of smartphone rather than direct shock - even at the expense of generally feeling well.<br />
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The real question is why do people feel the need to fill what once used to be stand-alone activities with digital snippets (the funniest part of the article by far is how the cable went out at a health club and people went ape shit about it). Exercise is a particularly good example; as a Runner I feel very strongly about this. At the lowest level we have people who need to go with other people and chat while they run - this I can at least understand. Then there are the misdemeanor offenders who can't go for a jog without their iPod. Finally, we have those who cannot go for a run if it is not in a health club, on a treadmill, while they watch something on TV - a crime which deserves capital punishment. I think this has something to do with This Modern Life, where we know we should be doing certain things that we don't actually care for. Then again, I am open to the possibility that people really really enjoy "running with an iPod" as an activity that is somehow different than simply "running". I was somehow going to end up with a comment on the democratization of information, but I forget how I was going to get there.<br />
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Sent from my Verizon Wireless Blackberry.Handyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09215237028041216312noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8733115636260645622.post-5403755286458596002010-08-07T20:27:00.000-07:002010-08-07T20:41:10.160-07:00Our bodies, ourselves, their patentsToday we have an article about the mingling of Business and Science. Honestly, for the first time in my life, reading an article about Science has driven me to nausea. The <a href="http://www.esquire.com/features/ESQ0601-JUNE_GENES_rev_">article</a>, by Wil Hylton, describes the, ahem, <span style="font-style: italic;">situation</span> we have today concerning patents on genetic material and some of the history on how we got here. Take home message: your DNA is legally owned by a collection of bodies - some governmental, some academic, some for profit. Warning: his writing style seems to aim to make people irate, but he redeems himself with a poignant moment at the end. It is not hard to reach the end, thoroughly fascinating from start to finish.<br /><br />One of his main themes is the public's awareness, or lack thereof, of what is happening. Hylton stresses that having genes and such be patented is technically equivalent to making our knowledge of DNA public, but does not really address why his article is important, namely, that it is informing us of how much of our body legally belongs to somebody else. How then are we supposed to find out about important, game-changing discoveries in Biotechnology?Blogs? Newspapers? Nobody reads through patents for fun, perhaps someone should publish a review on genetic patents.Handyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09215237028041216312noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8733115636260645622.post-29170404136666370872010-08-01T18:26:00.000-07:002010-08-01T18:39:13.714-07:00Follow up: BP and scientist contracts<p>Thanks to a professor of mine, here is an official position from the Professors on the issue of BP trying to restrict access to research done on the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. I first posted on this a while ago and nobody big seems to have picked this story up. The most important point from this piece is that we live in a society where there is simply too much information for the average or even well-educated and aware citizen to process, yet this information is extremely important to making society run. Thus, we have professionals to interpret it for us. What happens when corporations buy these professionals? Theoretically, bad things happen. I haven't figured out whether this qualifies as part of the "dark side of science" but I certainly don't like what BP is trying to do and we should commend anybody who refuses to sign such a contract.</p><p>The other story here is how nobody in the mainstream media has picked this up. Do they not think the scientists are important enough to report on? Has Shirley Sherrod made us completely forget about BP? So far after a brief search on the web, in addition the Guardian source I first found on this issue, only blogs and NPR seem to have commented on this.<br /></p><p><br /></p><p><span style=";font-family:verdana,arial,helvetica,sans-serif;font-size:85%;" ><img alt="Newsletter banner" src="http://www.aaup2.org/newsroom/newsletters/blueheader.jpg" align="baseline" border="0" /></span></p> <p><span style="font-family:Verdana;">The following piece by AAUP president Cary Nelson--about BP's impact on academic freedom following the Gulf oil spill-- was published in <a href="http://www.insidehighered.com/views/2010/07/22/nelson" target="_blank"><i><span style="color: rgb(0, 128, 128);">Inside Higher Ed</span></i></a> on Thursday, July 22.It was followed by interviews with the BBC, the Associated Press, and United Press International. Stories quoting the AAUP president and citing the organization then appeared in over 2,000 media outlets in such countries as Australia, Britain, Canada, Greece, France, Khazakstan, and New Zealand. </span></p> <p><span style="font-size:medium;"><span style="color: rgb(0, 128, 128);"><span style="font-family:Verdana;">BP and Academic Freedom</span></span></span><br /> <span style="font-family:Verdana;">On Friday, July 16, Ben Raines, a reporter for Mobile, Alabama’s <span style="color: rgb(0, 128, 128);"><i><a href="http://blog.al.com/live/2010/07/bp_buys_up_gulf_scientists_for.html" target="_blank"><span style="color: rgb(0, 128, 128);">Press-Register</span></a></i></span>, published a story detailing extensive efforts by BP to employ scientists engaged in (or likely to engage in) research about the massive oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. <i>Inside Higher Ed </i>has since conducted independent interviews for <a href="http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2010/07/20/oil" target="_blank"><span style="color: rgb(0, 128, 128);">its own coverage</span></a>. The contracts offered by the giant company, according to both sources, restrict the scientists from publishing research results, sharing them with other scientists, or even talking about them for as long as three years, a serious restraint in the midst of an ongoing crisis. </span></p> <p><span style="font-family:Verdana;">Both during the immediate crisis and for an extended period as government leaders and the courts figure out how to respond to the Gulf tragedy, the work these scientists do will essentially belong to BP, which will be free to suppress it or characterize it in any way it chooses. Faculty members under contract to BP, meanwhile, would be unable to testify against the company in court and would be available to testify on the company’s behalf. Several faculty members in the area have confirmed to the American Association of University Professors that they have been offered contracts by BP in exchange for restrictive confidentiality clauses. A notably chilling provision directs contracted scientists to communicate through BP’s lawyers, thus raising the possibility that research findings will be constrained by lawyer-client privilege.</span></p> <p><span style="font-family:Verdana;">The oil spill is not only a catastrophic economic and environmental disaster for the Gulf region; it also has major implications for energy policy in both the United States and the rest of the world. The ability to share research results promptly and freely is not only a basic tenet of academic freedom; in this case, it is also critical to the health of the region and the world. While more investigative work is needed, the very prospect of an interested corporation worth billions of dollars blocking the free exchange of university research and controlling the work scientists choose to do is deeply disturbing. If knowledgeable scientists cannot testify in court, the ability of injured parties to win just compensation is also jeopardized. But the long-term threat to American society is still more grave: we need independent faculty voices, perhaps more so now — in a knowledge-based society — than ever before.</span></p> <p><span style="font-family:Verdana;">In its founding 1915 Declaration, the AAUP warned of the “danger of restrictions upon the expression of opinions” that “call into question the moral legitimacy or social expediency of economic conditions or commercial practices in which large vested interests are involved.” Our 2004 “<a href="http://www.aaup.org/NR/rdonlyres/7B12F7B9-FA00-44DD-999F-FFA21AAE1F39/0/CorporateFundingonAcaResearch.pdf" target="_blank"><span style="color: rgb(0, 128, 128);">Statement on Corporate Funding of Academic Research</span></a>” establishes the fundamental standard: “Such contracts should explicitly provide for the open communication of research results, not subject to the sponsor’s permission for publication.”</span></p> <p><span style="font-family:Verdana;">Universities that prohibit faculty members from doing research that violates this principle, in my view, are protecting academic freedom, not restricting it. Of course in recommending that universities enforce this principle I am going beyond current AAUP policy. The world has changed. The increasing impact of corporate funding on the integrity of faculty research is among the changes higher education must confront. The decision about whether to sign restrictive contracts is not simply a matter of individual choice. It has broad implications for higher education and for the society at large.</span></p> <p><span style="font-family:Verdana;">At least one university has refused an institution-wide contract with BP for exactly these reasons. Many individual faculty members are declining BP offers or withdrawing from existing ones. Perhaps this is the time to reexamine the increasing role corporations are playing in funding and controlling university research. Universities should work with faculty to set ethical standards for industry collaboration that champion the public interest and discourage faculty members from selling their freedom of speech and research to the highest bidder.</span></p> <span style="font-family:Verdana;">Meanwhile, we urge other news media to join the effort to interview area scientists, gather copies of BP contracts, and publish the results. This story needs to be told in full. Universities should also consider where the public interest lies before permitting faculty members to sign contracts that limit the free exchange of information and bar public testimony. BP itself should certainly invest in research related to the spill, but it should do so without curtailing either faculty members’ free speech rights or their academic freedom. To do otherwise could prove hazardous to all of our health.</span>Handyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09215237028041216312noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8733115636260645622.post-24249541662585468052010-07-22T16:56:00.000-07:002010-07-22T17:00:52.783-07:00Kind of the assumption we've all been going onQuote of the day comes from the Gulf Coast:<br /><br /><blockquote><p class="first-child"></p></blockquote><blockquote><blockquote><p class="first-child">Good scientists, they're going to be giving their opinions based on the facts and they are not going to bias their opinions”</p></blockquote> <span class="endquote"> </span><span class="quote-credit">Professor Irv Mendelssohn</span> <span class="quote-credit-title">Louisiana State University<br /><br /></span></blockquote>This comes from an <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-10731408">article</a> about a contract BP is giving to scientists they are trying to hire to conduct research on the infamous spill in the Gulf of Mexico. Apparently anybody that BP hires is prohibited from publishing on or talking about the data they collect for at least three years. Sad that we have to repeat this after so many years, maybe the postmodernists are winning after all.Handyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09215237028041216312noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8733115636260645622.post-38201166358648744042010-07-18T11:20:00.000-07:002010-07-18T12:01:47.607-07:00Jizzing around for 600 million yearsKurt Vonnegut once said that when we write, we write as if we were doing it for one specific person in mind. I believe he said he often wrote for his sister. This is a post about jizz, or more specifically the sperm therein, so I am writing it for my buddy Robert. He will recognize not one but two reasons why.<br /><br />Recently, researchers identified what appears to be THE gene for sperm production (<a href="http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/07/100715172000.htm">http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/07/100715172000.htm</a>). As in it is found across many if not all of the phyla of the animal kingdom. Humans, rainbow trout, sea anemones - if you are an animal and you produce sperm then you have this gene. The gene goes by the name of Boule and it's significance lies in the fact that it has remained unchanged over 600 million years of evolution. Sounds impressive, but you might mention that humans share a large percentage of our genome with fruit flies. Well apparently sex related genes are changing all the time, but Boule is so vital to what we would call an animalian experience that it has remained the same throughout the eons.<br /><br />The lead author, Eugene Xu, suggests that this discovery has several real-world applications; it may lead to a different approach to pest control and even a new human male contraceptive. On the latter front, I only wish him the best of luck. When a lot of guys still believe that pulling out is the second best alternative to a condom, I do not think they will take to something that requires them to mess with what's made in the family jewels. What most people don't know is that we probably could have a male contraceptive pill that was based on hormones a decade or two ago, but cultural attitudes in the Western world were so against it that almost all research and development was stopped. It would have been just as safe as The Pill that we are all so familiar with now, but many men were completely against that could be perceived as tinkering with anything "Down There". This story is captured in "The Male Pill" by Nelly Oudshoorn. My guess is that 15 years from now us Dudes will be no less open to the idea of having our Sperm Gene shut off (or whatever the approach might be) than we were to having our hormones messed with 20 years ago. The book I mentioned talks as much about how masculinity is envisioned as it does with the nuts and bolts of hormone therapy. (Perhaps unsurprisingly?) India and China were actually interested in the male pill, but the hurdles of getting this approach to work in places like Great Britain were insurmountable. Among other things they needed to develop special clinics for the men involved.While the book does a better job of explaining it, the medical system and its infrastructure were just not able to pull through.<br /><br />On a somewhat related note - talking about reproductive issues and the medical infrastructure - <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/18/magazine/18abortion-t.html?hpw">here</a> is an interesting story in the NYT Magazine about how the abortion "landscape" has changed and how the medical system has adapted and incorporated the procedure.Handyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09215237028041216312noreply@blogger.com0