Alex Palazzo is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Biochemistry at The University of Toronto.
What a beautiful day. We just got back from a walk in Mt Auburn Cemetery where we randomly came across Richard Buckminster Fuller's grave. Unfortunately I didn't have my camera. Fortunately we live in the time of the internet where information and photos can be acquired within seconds. (The photo on the left was ripped off of Wikipedia.) In addition we saw William Morton's grave. He's the guy who discovered that either could be used as an anaesthetic. The site was marked by a monument erected "by the citizens of Boston".
Getting back to this idea, of how we are living in a revolutionary time with respect to information, the topic was recently discussed in this podcast that I've been listening to of late,Dan Carlin's Extreme History. In the most recent episode he interviews the great popularizer of history, James Burke. They discus the rise and fall of civilizations (including our own), and the idea that our time will be remembered as the period when information was liberated to the masses. Unforetunately we are still living with antiquated institutions that we inherited from a time when the access to information was limited to a much smaller subset of the population.
Besides This American Life, Radiolab, the Nature and Science Podcasts, lately I've been listening to quite a few interesting shows. These include The History of Rome Podcast, In Our Time with Melvyn Bragg (BBC) and Science & the City from The New York Academy of Sciences. If you've been listening to anything interesting, let me know.
Moving on ...
I recently read an interesting post by John Timmer entitled An editorial war on science (HT: RPM). The NY Times OpEd section has been dedicating quite a bit of space to individuals who are critical or even down right hostile to science. They've hosted essays by Behe, Brownback and Davies . From Timmer:
Not content with undermining the nature and practice of science, the editorial page has gone on to question the very rationale for science itself. In a truly odd piece, The Times advanced the claim that science was little more than an act of faith, the faith that the universe is regular and comprehensible. This claim gets so many things wrong it's hard to know where to start.(click here for my thoughts on Davies' views)
And I'll end with some politics. There are two good interviews of Ron Paul and Denis Kucinich on Bill Moyers' site. And on NOW's website, there are oodles of great shows including an episode on those who specialize in political smear tactics, the latino vote, Ron Paul and the internet, the subprime mortgage scandal and a look at a political scandal that involves the oil industry.
OK I'm off to enjoy the rest of the day.
Humanities & Social Science
Comments
http://www.400monkeys.com/God/
Thought you would appreciate this.
Posted by: btm | January 12, 2008 8:43 PM
Very nice. Reminds me of this: Battleground God
Posted by: apalazzo | January 13, 2008 2:52 PM
the idea that our time will be remembered as the period when information was liberated to the masses.
I think it may well go down as the beginning of that period. With the exponential growth of information and as computers become ubiquitous and so much faster all the time, I think we are just starting to understand the ramifications of the information age.
Dave Briggs :~)
Posted by: Dave Briggs | January 15, 2008 1:12 PM