jlynch
Posts by this author
Births
1640 - Philippe de la Hire, French mathematician and astronomer
1905 - Thomas Townsend Brown, American scientist
1907 - John Zachary Young, British biologist
Deaths
1907 - Marcellin Berthelot, French chemist
Events
1950 - Researchers announce the creation of Californium.
Births
1870 - Horace Donisthorpe, British entomologist
1881 - Walter Rudolf Hess, Swiss physiologist and Nobel Prize laureate
1931 - David Peakall, British scientist
Deaths
1764 - George Parker, 2nd Earl of Macclesfield, English…
Events
1867 - Publication of an article by Joseph Lister outlining the discovery of antiseptic surgery.
Births
1750 - Caroline Herschel, German-born English astronomer
1789 - Georg Simon Ohm, German physicist
1794 - Ami Boué, Austrian geologist
1834 - James Hector, Scottish geologist
1851 -…
John Wilkins and I have been at the Edges and Boundaries of Biological Objects workshop here in Salt Lake City for the past few days. John live-blogged some of the talks, so you may want to check his posts out. Lots of interesting stuff was discussed about populations (here and here), the fossil…
Events
2004 - Announcement of the discovery of 90377 Sedna, the farthest natural object in the Solar system so far observed.
Births
1713 - Nicolas Louis de Lacaille, French astronomer
1813 - John Snow, English epidemiologist
1821 - Johann Josef Loschmidt, Austrian scientist
1854 - Emil Adolf von…
A Cow Mourning For Her Calf
Oft at some consecrated altar-side,Where fragrant incense burns, a calf lies slain,And from his breast breathes out the warm life-tide:But the lone mother, o’er the grassy landFar ranging, sees his cloven hoof-prints plain,And leaves with roving eyes no spot…
Events
1942 - John Bumstead and Orvan Hess became the first in the world to successfully treat a patient, Anne Miller, using penicillin.
Births
1835 - Giovanni Schiaparelli, Italian astronomer
1854 - Paul Ehrlich, German scientist and Nobel Prize laureate
1862 - Vilhelm Bjerknes, Norwegian…
Events
1781 - William Herschel discovers Uranus.
1925 - Scopes Trial: A law in Tennessee prohibits the teaching of evolution.
1930 - The news of the discovery of Pluto was telegraphed to the Harvard College Observatory.
Births
1720 - Charles Bonnet, Swiss naturalist and writer
1733 - Joseph…
Births
1824 - Gustav Kirchhoff, German physicist
1835 - Simon Newcomb, American astronomer and mathematician
1838 - William Henry Perkin, English chemist
1863 - Vladimir Vernadsky, Russian mineralogist
1880 - Henry Drysdale Dakin, British-American biochemist
1881 - Gunnar Nordström, Finnish…
Theodore Beale, a.k.a. "Vox Day", quote-miner and "Christian libertarian opinion columnist," apparently has issues with women in science. This via Ed Brayton:
Because they are the intellectual driving force of humanity, men will be fine. They will simply continue to do what they have always done…
Births
1910 - Robert Havemann, German chemist
1920 - Nicolaas Bloembergen, Dutch physicist and Nobel Prize laureate
Deaths
1920 - Julio Garavito Armero, Colombian astronomer
1955 - Alexander Fleming, Scottish scientist and Nobel Prize laureate
1977 - Ulysses S. Grant IV, American geologist
Events
1977 - Rings of Uranus: Astronomers discover rings around Uranus.
1982 - Syzygy: all nine planets align on the same side of the Sun.
2006 - Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter arrives at Mars.
Births
1628 - Marcello Malpighi, Italian physician
1709 - Georg Steller, German naturalist
Deaths
1585 -…
Yesterday I took John Wilkins to the Feathered Dinosaurs and the Origin of Flight exhibit at the Arizona Natural History Museum. It was a wonderful opportunity to see 30+ fossils from China along with assorted models and recreations, particularly of Deinonychus (above, particularly cool),…
Apparently it is PZ's birthday. Wander on over and remind him how old he is ...
Events
2006 - Liquid water is discovered on Enceladus, the sixth largest moon of Saturn.
Births
1564 - David Fabricius, German astronomer
1758 - Franz Joseph Gall, German neuroscientist & phrenologist
1887 - Fritz…
The National Center for Science Education has launched ExpelledExposed.com which will contain responses to Ben Stein’s pro-ID crapola Expelled once the movie goes live on April 18th.
Our Overlords are launching a "Super Reader" program which allows us to nominate two readers to receive super powers. Well not so much super powers as the ability to tag posts to appear in a RSS feed that will be on the Sb front page. You get to choose the posts throughout the Sb network that you…
Sincerest apologies for being MIA for quite a while now. This week in particular was hectic (in good ways) and time to blog was negligible. Two candidates interviewed and the systematics workshop was excellent. But it is now Saturday, Spring Break has started, and I theoretically have some down…
Richard Dawkins was talking here tonight. Unfortunately because of family commitments I wasn’t able to make it and ended up giving my ticket to Wilkins who has his thoughts already online. Jim Lippard (whom Wilkins and I are grabbing a beer with on Saturday) has a comment or two on the talk up. By…
Apologies for no Monday Mustelid yesterday. Busy, busy.
Events
1675 - John Flamsteed appointed first Astronomer Royal
1774 - First sighting of Orion Nebula by William Herschel.
1997 - Bill Clinton bans federally funded human cloning research.
2002 - Canada bans human embryo cloning but permits…
Events
1879 - The United States Geological Survey is created.
Births
1918 - Dr. Arthur Kornberg, American biochemist and Nobel Prize laureate
Deaths
1703 - Robert Hooke, English scientist
1765 - William Stukeley, English archaeologist
1988 - Sewall Wright, American evolutionary biologist
1999 -…
Things I can do that I no longer need to do (from here by way of here). Examining this list will no doubt tell you a lot about what I spent the past nearly forty years doing with technology.
Adjusting rabbit ears on top of a TV
Adjusting a television’s horizontal and vertical holds
Adjusting a…
It’s going to be quite the busy week here at ASU. John Wilkins is in town, as is Richard Dawkins. For the latter’s talk on Thursday, I’ve managed to snag VIP tickets - courtesy of the RDF - for Wilkins and I. Then we also have the launch of the International Institute for Species Exploration (…
No real time to post anything substantial - still grading and we have job candidates in this coming week. Still, here’s something to keep you amused.
Events
1808 - The inaugural meeting of the Wernerian Natural History Society was held in Edinburgh.
1972 - The Pioneer 10 space probe is launched…
Events
1896 - Henri Becquerel discovers radioactivity.
1966 - Venera 3 crashes on Venus becoming the first spacecraft to land on another planet.
1980 - Voyager 1 probe confirms that Janus (moon of Saturn) exists.
Births
1910 - Archer John Porter Martin, English chemist and Nobel Prize laureate…
Vox Day - who writes for WorldNetDaily - has published a book, The Irrational Atheist which is available for free online. It’s an attack on Hitchens, Harris, Dawkins and other "new atheists". Brent Rasmussen over at Unscrewing the Inscrutable has taken the book very seriously. So I decided to check…
Some quick takes as I’m still too busy to write anything significant ...
With everything going on at the moment, I’ve been neglecting to post on the Irish rugby team’s performance in the Six Nations Championship. On the 7th they lost to France (26-21) and today they beat Scotland, 34-13. So that is…