thusspakezuska
Posts by this author
October 27, 2007
Since Jim Watson's recent self-destruction, there's been a lot of talk about pseudo-scientific racism versus actual "scientific" studies of race. Earlier this summer, Lennard J. Davis had an essay in the Chronicle of Higher Education titled A Grand Unified Theory of Interdisciplinarity in which he…
October 26, 2007
By now everyone knows that Jim Watson has resigned his position at CSHL. But the damage he's done will live on long afterwards. Consider this comment from a reader (emphasis added):
As a non-scientist, I'd like to point out an unpredictable side-effect of Watson's remarks that might make…
October 25, 2007
So you're despairing of your future as an academic research scientist, and looking for "alternative" careers. When I was a grad student and postdoc I often heard my fellow students/postdocs say things like "well, I'll just get a teaching job" or "I'll just go teach at a community college". The…
October 24, 2007
Didn't you get something like this from your parents when you were younger?
"You kids don't know how easy you have it. When I was young, I had to walk to school! In the snow! Uphill! Both ways!"
Well, a bunch of us Sciencebloggers recently got to reminiscing about the good ol' days, when we…
October 24, 2007
PZ Myers is a really nice person and I love Pharyngula - I just spent a nice half hour reading it, and among other good stuff I encountered there was a link in this post to Robert Hooke's notebooks online. Very cool indeed, and totally geekalicious.
But I'm also aware of this recent distasteful…
October 19, 2007
The latest Watson news is that Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory has "suspended [his] administrative responsibilities...pending further deliberation by the board." Watson, meanwhile, has begun the "Did I say that? No! I didn't mean it!" apologia that usually follows when some noted figure catches…
October 19, 2007
This week's Friday Bookshelf is actually a repeat of a blog post from the old blog site. It begins with a question:
Who was Annie Montague Alexander?
She lived from 1867 to 1950. Naturalist and philanthropist, she was the founder of two natural history museums at the University of California,…
October 18, 2007
You may have noticed on the main Scienceblogs page that the major categories have been reduced in number and renamed; we now have eight, each with its own spiffy landing page. For example, here's the one for Education & Careers. Each landing page has a photo at the top; these photos will be…
October 18, 2007
From the BBC News:
The Science Museum has cancelled a talk by American DNA pioneer Dr James Watson after he claimed black people were less intelligent than white people...saying his views went "beyond the point of acceptable debate".
Skills Minister David Lammy said Dr Watson's views "were deeply…
October 17, 2007
Primate Diaries passed this meme on to me. It was started by Scibling PZ Myers at Pharyngula as a means of demonstrating evolution in cyberspace.
First, the rules:
There are a set of questions below that are all of the form, "The best [subgenre] [medium] in [genre] is...". Copy the questions,…
October 17, 2007
Washington Post reports on the appointment of Susan Orr:
The Bush administration again has appointed a chief of
family planning programs at the Department of Health and Human Services
who has been critical of contraception.
Susan Orr, most recently an associate commissioner in the Administration…
October 17, 2007
Spitting on Rosalind Franklin's grave is apparently not satisfying enough for Jim Watson. When you are a largemouth ass, you have to do much, much more. So now he's maligned all of Africa and everyone of African descent. Here's a quote:
he was "inherently gloomy about the prospect of Africa"…
October 16, 2007
By way of the Chronicle News Blog...researchers are using a brain-computer interface to allow physically-impaired people move an avatar around in Second Life.
The system consists of a headpiece equipped with electrodes that monitor activity in three areas of the motor cortex (the region of the…
October 16, 2007
Really. I am not making this up. As quoted in The Guardian:
He smiles. "Rosalind is my cross," he says slowly. "I'll bear it. I think she was partially autistic." He pauses for a while, before repeating the suggestion, as if to make it clear that this is no off-the-cuff insult, but a considered…
October 15, 2007
So, it's Blog Action Day, and we're all supposed to post something related to the environment. Science Woman has a very hopeful post about how "having a daughter has brought the idea of intergenerational responsibility into much sharper focus" for her.
What shall I tell you? I spent a good part…
October 14, 2007
I just want to remind those of you who have donated and those of you who might be thinking of donating to Donors Choose, that if you want to receive your nifty Women in Math and Science magnet AND have a chance to win the "Don't Make Me Puke On Your Shoes" t-shirt, you need to send me a copy of…
October 12, 2007
So eight of you, besides me, so far, think that Donors Choose is a worthy cause. The generous eight have had an impact on 305 students! (See the Leaderboard for details.)
Anybody else? Also, remember the cool prizes available if you donate.
Chad at Uncertain Principles has harangued his…
October 12, 2007
I love it. You must read this book review in the TimesOnline (found via Arts & Letters Daily) of Deborah Cameron's The Myth of Mars and Venus: Do Men and Women Really Speak Different Languages? Commenting on Cameron's take on all the myths about language differences between men and women:
For…
October 12, 2007
By now you've no doubt heard that Al Gore and the United Nations' Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change were awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. I must confess that this announcement gives me no small degree of schadenfreude when I think of how the denizens of the White House must be feeling about…
October 11, 2007
I completely blanked out on Scientiae for October, so I really don't want to do that again for November. Yami is hosting, and you can find her call for post here. The theme is talking to yourself which god knows I do enough of, sitting home all day with the cats. I mean, don't get me wrong,…
October 11, 2007
Apparently the shabby prizes I am offering are not enough to entice very many of you to donate to Donors Choose.
But perhaps you will perk up and open your wallets when you see what Seed is giving away to generous readers!
In addition to the $15,000 in matching funds that Seed is putting up for…
October 10, 2007
From the Chronicle of Higher Education, Home-Schooled Students Rise in Supply and Demand:
"Home schooling often really allows students to develop a passion," says Sabena Moretz, associate director of admissions at Richmond. "With a traditional high school, most of the time you don't see a kid who's…
October 9, 2007
I know I would. So how do you do that? Well, Seed Media Group will help you by matching your donation. The first $15,000 in donations made through the Scienceblogs Challenge will be matched by Seed Media Group through its Science Literacy Grants. From the press release:
Seed Media Group is…
October 9, 2007
MentorNet, the premier e-mentoring organization, has recently launched the MentorNet Blog. Mary Fernandez tells us in the inaugural entry:
In this blog, I plan to explore the inspiring, unexpected, and exciting reasons to choose a STEM career, and I am asking the MentorNet community to help me…
October 8, 2007
One of my readers recently wrote to me to talk about the frustrations of trying to manage a career in science while needing to work part-time for a period of time, due to health concerns.
Part-time employment is something that many of us might want to consider for a variety of reasons, at various…
October 8, 2007
Thanks to those of you who have donated so far! You've helped get the TSZ challenge to 39% of fulfillment!
The way Donors Choose works, more than one person can add a proposal to a challenge, and/or individuals could choose to donate to a proposal separate from a challenge. That's why you will…
October 8, 2007
So it seems there's a $10,000 blogging scholarship, and ScienceBlog's own Shelley Batts has made the cut! (Second year in a row!) She's one of 20 finalists and, I believe, the only science blogger among the 20. And she could really use the money. And wouldn't it be way cool to have a woman…
October 5, 2007
What does it take to be included in The Best Science Writing 2007?
Well, it helps if you write for the New Yorker or the New York Times. Eleven of 20 contributions selected for this volume originally appeared in the New Yorker or the New York Times or New York Times Magazine. It also helps if…
October 5, 2007
I spent a lot of time on airplanes in the last few weeks, and so I spent a lot of time reading in-flight magazines. Southwest's Spirit is not so bad. In the pages of the September edition I learned about Galco's Soda Pop Stop in Los Angeles, dedicated to preserving all the unique and tasty soda…
October 5, 2007
Dr. Free-Ride has provided a nice summary of how the Science Bloggers' Challenge for Donors Choose is going so far. And can you believe those readers over at Mike Dunford's blog? They've already maxed out his challenge!
And you all are no slouches either...look at Dr. Free-Ride's top five lists…