Sciencewomen

My eponym

Posted by SciWo on November 15, 2007
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I never officially participated in the last World’s Fair meme (although if you google “Minnow motherhood insanity” you get this blog), but now Dave Ng has another fun meme for us.

Anyway, this meme asks that you come up with your own scientific eponym. What’s that exactly? Well, first read this excellent primer by Samuel Arbesman, which basically provides a step by step description of how to do this effectively. Then have a go at your own blog. If all goes well, I’d like to create a page at the Science Creative Quarterly, that collects (and links to) the good ones.

Thus, I present you with Sciencewoman’s Law:
sciencewoman's law

Explanation of sciencewoman's law
There may be a constant of undetermined value in there as well to reflect the efficiency of one’s idea generation mechanism. This would vary from blogger to blogger and might be time-variable as well. I’d add it, but I already made the figures, and well, I don’t have time. Hence…

Of course, this can all be simplified to
self-explanatory equation
but that’s probably already been claimed.

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Comments

  1. #1 John Coleman
    November 15, 2007

    This is it – 1/70, to be prcise, assuming t in years.
    My final post. Lacking any insight or creativity

  2. #2 ScienceWoman
    November 15, 2007

    A few muddled clarifications.

    I meant z to have units of years. Thus a nine-month old results in K to the 4/3 power.

    Oddly enough, my eta is 4/3 at the moment. This suggests that there is definitely a constant missing – maybe a multiplier, maybe an exponential – but calibration is needed. I might also need to adjust the Beta factor. I just realized that if you have one student working for you, Beta is always 1 regardless of the number of projects you are involved with. Doesn’t seem quite fair. But I’m not sure how to represent the math. I wanted to capture that research is easier when you have students, but that managing the students can become a chore in and of itself.

    Any other suggested revisions?

  3. #3 Brad
    November 16, 2007

    I’m concerned that because x=0 for a class you are teaching for the first time, there is an undefinable term in the equation. Then again, maybe that’s intended for that first-time class…

  4. #4 Sciencewoman
    November 16, 2007

    Brad: I like your interpretation, but I think I got my math wrong (again!)…I meant to define x = the xth time you’ve taught the class

  5. #5 ScienceWoman
    November 16, 2007

    Geesh. I think I should stop writing math in a hurry. I may take this down and revise it this weekend. Hopefully my paper revisions are making more sense.

  6. #6 Freiddie
    November 17, 2007

    This is a new idea to me. Expressing my life in terms of math?!? I should try that some time.

  7. #7 George
    April 4, 2008

    There is definitely a variable lacking here, or more precisely,another principle which has not been factored in.

    That principle is the rule stating that time posting blogs tends to interfere with and utilize time which should be used for other, probably more disagreeable, endeavors. This is why major corporations monitor every office peon’s internet use.

    Of course, I’ll grant that certain factors, such as young children, tend to steal back some of this available time. One doesn’t mess around when a child utilizes unconventional means, such as a big rock, to open a “child-proof” bottle.

    It is, however, quite easy to delegate taking roll in a classroom, or to delay a project a few minutes. Perhaps an equation reflecting these time theft factors could be developed, and utilized in conjunction with the existing formula. I’d offer to help, but I’ve hated math since I learned that pi goes on forever, and life doesn’t.