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How's Your Vocabulary?

tags: vocabulary, online quiz Your Vocabulary Score: A+ Congratulations on your multifarious vocabulary! You must be quite an erudite person. How's Your Vocabulary? How about you? By the way, I actually have linked to an even better vocabulary game that will appear Sunday. The upcoming game will ask you to define vocabulary words and, if you get the word correct, you not only get a harder word to define, but the game will also donate ten grains of rice to the United Nations to help end world hunger. Weird, I know, but it's a fun game!

What Your Hands Say About You

tags: hands, online quiz What Your Hands Say About You You are logical, analytical, and rational. You have good verbal skills. Idealistic and dreamy, you tend toward the impractical. You have a knack for getting yourself in sticky situations. Brainy and intelligent, you are intellectual to the point of being incomprehensible. Your emotions tend to be nervous and potent. Your energy - both positive and negative - deeply impacts your life. What Do Your Hands Say About You? I had no idea that hands could say so many conflicting things about a person .. did you?

How Rare is Your Personality Type?

tags: personality type, online quiz Your Personality is Very Rare (INTP) Your personality type is goofy, imaginative, relaxed, and brilliant. Only about 4% of all people have your personality, including 2% of all women and 6% of all men You are Introverted, Intuitive, Thinking, and Perceiving. How Rare Is Your Personality? 4% of all people have my personality type, including 2% of all women and 6% of all men .. does this mean that there are fewer men than women out there if only 4% of everyone shares this personality type?

Worth reading: Better condoms, government handouts, and online violence

A few of the recent pieces I've liked: L.V. Anderson at Slate: We Should Have a Better Condom by Now. Here’s Why We Don’t Emily Badger and Christopher Ingraham at Wonkblog: The rich get government handouts just like the poor. Here are 10 of them. Mark Binelli in the New York Times: Inside America’s Toughest Federal Prison Ashley Judd at Mic: Forget Your Team: Your Online Violence Toward Girls and Women Is What Can Kiss My Ass Jonathan Cohn at the Huffington Post: Working Parents Should Be Very Happy About This Obscure Senate Vote

Sign some more

Here's another online petition you can sign — this one is to censure Kathy Griffin's censorship. Go ahead and sign, although I'm beginning to wonder if the reason people aren't marching in the streets and fending off flying teargas canisters and roaring angrily in person at the bad guys is that they're too damned busy filling out all these forms on their computers, instead. Maybe I need to create a new category here: "futile, impotent political posturing" or something. But at least it feels a little bit good. (via Greg Laden)

Sunday Times Round-Up Addendum

One item I forgot to mention in the previous post: The Times Book Review section today features an article on backlist books and the so-called "Long Tail" exploited by on-line sales. It has some interesting stuff on the business of publishing and the sales of backlist books. As with the medical story referenced in the previous post, I'd be interested to hear what any of the publishing types out there think of this. As an outsider, it sounds interesting enough, but it could be horribly inaccurate, and I'd never be able to tell.

The Future... And Beyond!

It's almost finished now, so this is a little late in being posted, but the Washington Post has been running a week-long series of on-line chats with noted "futurists," under the title Beyond the Future. I'm a little dubious about most "futurism," but reading about people's predictions for future trends and gadgets can be a good way to waste a little time on a Friday afternoon, if you're so inclined... (Sadly, I can't really afford the time-- I've got to get back to my windowless basement lab, and align some optics...)

Count your bones!

My last Seed column is online. Print media feels a little weird — it's like I wrote that one long ago, the one I finished earlier in July is going to print right now (and will be out in mid-August), and I'm already working on the column after that. It's like looking at old history for me. It's also an old story for you subscribers. It's just those who haven't subscribed yet who are months behind the times. So when are you people going to join the rest of us…in the future?

Open Position: Climate Wiki Intern

A small non-profit concerned with climate change is seking a "Climate Wiki Intern" which sounds very interesting. Knowing that many of my readers would be very good at this, It thought it was worth a blog post to point you in this direction: Climate Wiki Intern Posted by: The Heartland Institute Posted date: Mar-05-12 Location: Chicago Description Responsibilities: The internship will involve a wide variety of online communication responsibilities, including writing and researching original articles, data entry, and basic "wiki" programming. Specific tasks include: Click here to read the full…

All-Purpose Political Commentary for 2011

It is my fervent hope that at some point in the future, we will once again live in a society where all discussions of politics are not indescribably depressing. Really, that pretty much sums up my feelings about everything in the news right now, on-line and off. There are a bunch of things going on that I sorta-kinda feel I maybe ought to write something about, but I think I'd rather slam my fingers in my desk drawer repeatedly than type any of those posts. People with happy news are encouraged to post it in the comments.

De-Lurking Week

Orac mentioned that he runs recurring De-Lurking Days on his blog. "Lurking" is to hang around a web forum or a blog without making your presence known. "De-Lurking" is to come out into the light of on-line day, however briefly. Aard currently has about a hundred visits by returning readers every day, and most regulars don't come here every day. This means that Aard must have several hundred lurkers. Dear Reader, is Aard on your blog reading list? Then please make a comment, as brief as you like. Thank you.

Four Stone Hearth Call for Submissions

At short notice, I've taken on hosting the next Four Stone Hearth blog carnival (about anthropology in the widest sense, including archaeology). It's supposed to come on-line on Wednesday. The carnival's home page currently doesn't reflect the change in scheduling, so you'll simply have to believe me. There is one small problem. I haven't received a single submission yet. This means that I will have to hunt around pertinent blogs I'm aware of to find good new stuff. Please help me by sending links to good stuff, your own or somebody else's!

Your psychologist could be an Intel chip....

Well, not really, but if on line CBT takes off, how will we know when they make the switch? Cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) seems to be effective when delivered online in real time by a therapist, with benefits maintained over 8 months. This method of delivery could broaden access to CBT in primary care. These are the conclusions of an article in this week's Global Mental Health special edition of The Lancet, written by Dr David Kessler, NIHR National School for Primary Care Research, University of Bristol and colleagues. source

Christmas shopping?

One of the small disadvantages of academia is that we get hopelessly busy just before Christmas, which makes squeezing in the gift shopping difficult. I'm probably not even going to step into a store until sometime around the end of next week. That's why you have to appreciate these online gift suggestions. I'm leaning towards the Televangelists' Rapture Early-Warning System as a universally useful gift for my family members of all faiths. Even the atheists should like the half-hour warning before the Rapture so they can rapidly convert!

links for 2008-06-18

June 18: Polar Land and Life Day Happy birthday to me... (tags: animals environment science news education biology geology) Halo: The Cole Protocol (and welcome to all you new readers) at Tobias Buckell Online "Project X" revealed. (tags: books games SF blogs) The Giant's Shoulders A monthly science blogging event about classic science papers. (tags: blogs science history) Testing your free energy machine. "Here therefore is the Built on Facts Protocol for testing perpetual motion or free energy. It is a literal instantiation of a black box test." (tags: physics energy blogs)

A Glossary of Insect Surface Sculpturing

Areolate In 1979, Rick Harris wrote a definitive paper illustrating the various terms used by taxonomists to describe the intricate patterns on the insect exoskeleton. His guide is tremendously helpful to those of us who struggle to decide if those ridges on the head of an ant are strigate or costate.  Via Sifolinia, I now see that Harris's illustrations are available online: A Glossary of Surface Sculpturing Incidentally, Rick was the guy who taught me how to use a Scanning Electron Microscope, although at this point it'd be a minor miracle if I remembered any of it.

Inspiring Talks: Drew Endy

Good talks are rare gems. Good talks about interesting topics even rarer. Good talks that make you want to change fields and design E. Coli which smell like bananas are the best. I saw a good one earlier this week, and its now online: Learning to Program DNA by Drew Endy. If you get a chance, check out the picture of Drew going off a waterfall in a kayake on the Lower McCloud river. That's very close to where I grew up (and don't you city folk come up there and ruin that beautiful neck of the woods. Stay way slicker!)

Stealing Virtual Furniture

Can you be arrested for stealing furniture in a virtual world? The source of this question: Philip K. Dick? Nope, NPR: A teenager faces charges of stealing furniture that doesn't exist. The youth in the Netherlands was on one of those Web sites where you create virtual people to wander around virtual buildings spending what amounts to real money. You pay cash for credits to spend online. The 17-year-old allegedly stole $5,800 worth of imaginary furniture. Real police arrested him. They suspect other teens of receiving the stolen goods.

Apparently, I'm a robot ...

Easing myself into blogging with the Personality Defect Test. Apparently I’m a Robot: 100% Rational, 42% Extroverted, 14% Brutal and 0% Arrogant. Your exact opposite is the Class Clown. Other personalities you would probably get along with are the Hand-Raiser, the Emo Kid, and the Haughty Intellectual. I hated "class clowns" at school. PZ is a "Haughty Intellectual" with scores of 100/14/0/57... we seemed to get on when we met and he is remarkably quiet in meatspace compared to his online persona. He’s an arrogant bastard though :)

The Lancet Study.

By now, many of you will have heard of the recent Lancet study which claims that over 650,000 Iraqis have died due to the actions of the Bush administration. The paper is available online as a pdf. I haven't as yet had a chance to read the paper (still grading), but will just note that even if the estimate is too high, it is probable that the official estimate is too low. For further commentary by SciBlings see: Mike Dunford, Mark Chu-Carroll [here and here], Mike the Mad Biologist, Tim Lambert, and I'm sure others.

Something else you can do this weekend

OK, so you can't make it to Convergence in Bloomington, Minnesota this weekend, because you live in some strange foreign backwater like the United Kingdom. I guess you could go to the Royal Society Summer Science Exhibition instead, if you live somewhere out that way. It's going on right now, 3-8 July. Oh, wait: they've got a whole suite of online science videos and interactive games? And the whole world can participate? Even if you're in Bloomington? Uh-oh, we've got bigtime competition. Maybe some homeschoolers can check in and learn cool stuff, too.

GOING NUCLEAR: Do 70% of the Public Really Support Re-Investment in Atomic Power?

In my latest Science and the Media web column at Skeptical Inquirer Online, I take a look at the current debate over re-investment in nuclear energy as a means to curb greenhouse gas emissions and shift the country towards energy independence. I show that the same frames used in the nuclear energy debate during the 1970s are still in play today. I also review poll findings that indicate public support for nuclear energy has increased since 2001. However, comparisons to independent surveys show that public support isn't nearly as strong as industry-sponsored poll trends indicate.

Partyin’

I'll be back in online action in a while, but I thought I'd just mention that we had a grand time at the anti-superstition party, and today we had an equally lovely time touring the U Penn Museum with a few of the regular commenters (I hope they'll link to some of the photos they took: Jack C was our official tour photographer, I think). Now I have to relax for a bit and enjoy a nice dinner with Tom and Margaret Downey. I'm just posting this so you'll all be jealous and wish you'd shown up, too.

More info for my developmental biology students

The syllabus for Biol 4181, Developmental Biology is now online. Start reading! It looks like I'll have you reading 50-100 pages of Wolpert and Carroll or Zimmer a week. I want you all to know this is something of a miracle—I usually finish my syllabus the night before the class starts, so I'm very proud of myself for getting it done a whole four days ahead of time. Of course, the reason it's early is that I've got a stack of extra-curricular writing that needs to be done in the next couple of days…

Sporadic Blogging

You may have noticed a lack of new posts on this blog over the last few weeks. There are a few reasons for this, most of which involve being busy doing other things. I've been working a lot of hours at a part time job that doesn't allow for much online activity. We're also getting ready to relocate (again) - this time to Pensacola, Florida. Both of those factors will pretty much be done with by the middle of June. Until then, though, I'm not going to be able to blog as much as I'd like.

When will I ever learn?

I'm in London, and I got ambushed by this guy making videos. He bought me beer, what can I say? Anyway, he said he wanted to ask me serious questions about biology, and when he got me on camera he instead asked me all this weird stuff about constellations and telescopes and has me looking like a stammering moron. He'll probably put it online soon, and then I'll be in trouble. He goes by the name Andromeda's Wake. At least it was really good beer. My humiliation and profound ignorance made public:

Caturday? Ah Yes, A Clever Pun.....

John of Stranger Fruit tagged me in this meme, how could I resist? Your Score : SurpriseAdoption Cat 20% Affectionate, 57% Excitable, 20% Hungry Calloused. Heartless. Exuberant. You carry the heavy burden of informing children that they are adopted by jumping out of their birthday cake. A difficult task, but somebody must break the news to children on their only day of happiness.To see all possible results, checka dis. Link: The Which Lolcat Are You? Test written by GumOtaku on OkCupid Free Online Dating, home of the The Dating Persona Test I tag everyone!

How to dismantle a body

Don't be too grossed out, but the University of Wisconsin Madison has put a whole series of high-quality videos of human dissection online. It's extremely cool, but not for the squeamish—there's more than just the sight of a cadaver getting hacked up, and the sound of a saw on bone or a chisel being used to peel up the cranium are, ummm, memorable. At least you're spared the odor and the textures. I'd almost forgotten how muscular gross anatomy is—it takes some heft and brute force to take apart a body. (via Mind Hacks)

Peep and the Big Wide World

A reader conspires to make me feel old—I don't have any little kids running around in my house anymore, so I've completely missed this new cartoon, Peep and the Big Wide World. It's a science program for pre-schoolers! They've got sample videos online, and a list of science-related books. It looks like they do exactly the right thing, encouraging kids to observe and experiment and most importantly, ask questions. Darn kids. Why'd they have to grow up and stop being my excuse to sit down and watch morning cartoons?

Do you think libraries and librarians are important? (#scio10)

Librarians & Scientists: YMMV ...people (and more so engineers and scientists) consult their friends first, then their files, then after trying everything else, consult the library. It's sort of the library/librarian as goalie metaphor (you know, 10 other people missed the ball so the goalie has to save it). Science Online 2010: Scientists and librarians Stephanie Willen Brown and I did our level best to bust some stereotypes and suggest some points of contact during our (lightly-attended) session. I think we did a reasonably good job of it; I only wish we could have reached more people.

Coturnix on Civility and Politeness

I don't agree that civility is action and politeness is language. Politeness is formal arbitrary cultural convention, while civility is also arbitrary cultural convention but as dictated by Westernonormative agents. Both apply to language and behavior. But whatever. This post by Coturnix at A Blog Around the Clock is Bora's take on online civility as well as an excellent link farm pointing to all the other stuff out there on this topic, and this is what you should read in preparation to the civility session at Scionliten, this year's Science On Line conference.

Video of talk online...

So, I was supposed to go up to Montreal and Ottawa the past couple of days, but a series of miserable luck in terms of planes made it unworkable (it's complicated). Instead, I tried to record a presentation and get it onto the web so we could play it for them, and then take questions by skype. That also didn't work. However, we were successful in the end getting the video online. So if you're interested in what I say when I talk to the libraries, but haven't been to one of the conferences where I've spoken, take a look.

Shark Week!

What could be more exciting than Shark Week on Discovery Channel? It airs at 9pm Eastern every night this week. You can also see video clips online such as my personal favorite, the top 10 weird sharks. Be sure to check out the video clip of the frilled shark (above) which was once thought to be extinct. This Loch Ness Monster look-alike has enlarged gills that allow it to swim in the deep sea where oxygen levels are low. You can read more about the anatomy of the frilled shark here.

A poll for Minnesota Blogger of the Year?

I fear I'm about to stomp a bit hard on another poll — this one has my name on it, and is for Minnesota Blogger of the Year. This is kind of a nice friendly poll, so I feel a bit bad about demolishing it, but I have to stand on principle. Crush it, gang, crush it bad. It might be nice if you looked at the list of nominees, of course, and the fellow in the lead, Robert Erickson, was very amusing in his confrontation with teabaggers…but it's an online poll. I cannot resist. It must be pharyngulated.

John Aravosis' War Against the Poor

John Aravosis demonstrates once again why I refuse to call myself a progressive (italics mine): Seriously, any plan to bail these people out had better include a test to prove that they were hoodwinked by their mortgage broker. Otherwise, they gambled and they lost. Lots of people bought homes and did what it took to make their payments, and did make their payments, and others opted not to buy at all until the market settled down. We should not be bailing people out for being idiots, or for trying to make a fast buck, especially when it means the rest of us will now have to pay more for…

Christmas Cake Recipe

tags: Christmas Cake recipe, fruitcake, holidays I just had to share this amazing Christmas Cake recipe that I am going to try this year -- just in time to celebrate my first Christmas!  Ingredients: 2 cups flour 1 stick butter 1 cup of water 1 tsp baking  soda 1 cup of  sugar 1 tsp  salt 1 cup of  brown sugar Lemon juice 4  large eggs Nuts 2  bottles wine 2  cups of dried fruit Sample the wine to  check quality. Take a large bowl, check the wine again. To be sure  it is of the highest quality, pour one level cup and drink. Repeat.  Turn on the electric mixer. Beat…

Why labeling of GMOs is actually bad for people and the environment « The Berkeley Blog

Why labeling of GMOs is actually bad for people and the environment « The Berkeley Blog.   This is a very balanced and knowledge-based post by the widely respected agricultural economist, David Zilberman. Thankfully, he brings some science to this hot topic. It is an important read for everyone in California who votes as we will soon have an initiative on GMO Labeling on our ballot.   One small point. Professor Zilberman  indicates "Now, what about emergence of resistance to GMOs? ' Actually, the resistance is to the herbicide that is sprayed on the GMO. The more people plant HT crops, the…

Tweetlinks, 10-14-09

Follow me on Twitter to get these, and more, in something closer to Real Time (all my tweets are also imported into FriendFeed where they are much more easy to search and comment on, as well as into my Facebook wall where they are seen by quite a different set of people): The Audacity of Greed: How Private Health Insurers Just Blew Their Cover by Robert Reich: "Health insurers have just made the best argument yet about why a public insurance option is necessary." RT @Caterina: Things on the internet grow fungally, not virally. The metaphor is completely wrong. Open Access 101 - new animated…

Run the Numbers on Your Ride

There's a great post at The Oil Drum by Jeff Radtke that gives people a good way of evaluating the resource uses in their cars. Now you don't actually have to do this to figure out that light cars are better than heavy ones - the results aren't that difficult. But if you think it is fun to figure out smaller distinctions, it is worth doing. This type of analysis is useful because it is easy to factor in conversion efficiencies and payload versus tare weight. Rather than use motor output power, one can use the thermal power theoretically available in the flowing fuel. EROI may be factored in…

This is not a poll

But if you want to do a little something to tweak the noses of the Religious Right, the American Patriarchy Association has called for a letter writing campaign. It seems that Hallmark Greeting Cards are peddling a line of gay-friendly cards, which irks poor little Donald Wildmon something fierce. I don't know why. Maybe it's because they're cute, stylish, and witty, but at the same time he's afraid to mail a coming-out card to his Mom? Anyway, Wildmon is asking his flock to send negative letters to Hallmark. How about taking a moment to send the very best to thank Hallmark for being non-…

Found: The Perfect House for a Bed and Breakfast (and ME, too)!

tags: birds, bed and breakfast, investment opportunity Okay, do any of you want to help make an investment with me? Would you like to buy a house that I would turn in to a bed and breakfast? It is very cheap .. er, affordable .. because of one extra feature it has .. nesting vultures on the premises. Yes, indeed, it would be a fascinating place for bird watchers and nature lovers to visit, and I would love to host them, and I would love to be a proud steward of the black and turkey vultures who nest there (I have a soft place in my heart for vultures, after having met several tame turkey…

Weekend Fun: Books and Games

Weatherwise, last weekend was thawing and misty and overcast, so I didn't feel like doing much outdoors. I finished reading Daryl Gregory's new novel (didn't do much for me) and started Douglas Adams's fifth Hitch-hiker book. When it appeared in 1992 I didn't bother with it since it seemed too much like flogging an aging franchise, but 11-y-o Junior recently asked me to buy it for him and then he recommended it. So far it seems mildly entertaining. Had friends over for games: Settlers of Catan and Qwirkle. I was lucky enough to trade my old 80s Junta game for that Settlers box last week. I…

September Pieces Of My Mind #2

The former school / functions venue in my housing area has been converted into housing for single male asylum seekers. I'm putting a note on their front door, offering to teach them some boardgames. Wonder if the weight-loss advertisers realise that the pics of amply built women they intend to frighten female customers with are actually attractive to a bunch of dudes. They're basically providing free soft porn to a market segment who will never buy their product. If I had to be a war vet, then I'd prefer to be one whose son wrote Alice in Chains's "Rooster" about him. When I was a teen in…

"The Stoning of Sally Kern"

According to the 'Christian Martyr' Wikipedia page: * Saint Stephen, Protomartyr, was stoned c. 34 AD. * James the Great (Son of Zebedee) was beheaded in 44 AD. * Philip the Apostle was crucified in 54 AD. * Matthew the Evangelist killed with a halberd in 60 AD. * James the Just, beaten to death with a club after being crucified and stoned. * Matthias was stoned and beheaded. * Saint Andrew, St. Peter's brother, was crucified. * Saint Mark the Evangelist, was dragged in the streets of Alexandria then beheaded * Saint Peter, crucified upside-down. * Apostle…

Official Portrait Blogging 2013-14

Because I know there are still a few people who come here for the cute-kid pictures, I give you the official SteelyKid portrait for the 2013-14 academic year. This is actually a photo of a photo, because that's the easiest way to convert the print they sent us to a digital format, and also because it gave me an excuse to play with GIMP a little. It's not the greatest reproduction, but it's good enough for blogging. I'm not entirely sure what's up with her hair, here. There were a few days when she went in with a braid, and this might've been one. Or she might've asked somebody to put it up…

DonorsChoose Reminder: Tuckerize Your Pets, and Program This Blog

I haven't been flogging the DonorsChoose Blogger Challenge as hard this year as in past year, but I do want to post a reminder that the challenge is ongoing. If you donate, the money will go to help deserving school kids; if that's not enough, it can also earn you cool stuff like: The largest individual donor will get a signed copy of How to Teach Physics to Your Dog, and the chance to have their pet appear in the sequel. Want to read about your companion animal moving at relativistic speeds? Make a big donation (current leader is just over $370), and you can get it. Too cash-strapped to buy…

How to Teach Physics to Your Dog: Obsessive Update

A couple of reviews, an offer, and a mystery regarding How to Teach Physics to Your Dog: The reviews: A review at suite101 that went up a while ago, but I somehow missed in the vanity search. It's a nice, detailed review, and if I had to pick a pull quote it would probably be: "You can be prepared for a good scientific romp throughout Orzel's How to Teach Physics to Your Dog. Thinking like a dog is a big help." Scott at a physics teaching blog has a more recent review: "I often pick up books and don't bother finishing them. This book kept pulling me back to discover what oddity was next. I…

My Hugo Nomination Ballot

Cheryl Morgan has a post urging people to nominate for the Hugo Awards. While I don't place the same priority she does on the gender distribution of who gets nominated, I applaud her for doing this now, while there's a chance to influence the actual ballot, rather than waiting until April to complain about it. If you care about what science fiction and fantasy works win awards, go read what she says about it. I will also toss out another cheap way to influence the Hugo ballot and eventual winner. As a member of last year's Worldcon, I am entitled to nominate for this year's award. Here is my…

Israel-Palestine One-State Solution: Is This Clinton, Carter, Kissinger, or Obama?

I came home this evening after a grant submission and uploading a bunch of grant reviews hoping to open a bottle of Gruet Brut and write up my account of last week's Friday Fermentable Live!!! at ScienceOnline'09. While sitting down, my dear PharmGirl, MD, asked me to read this op-ed essay and scrolled it such that I could not read the author. I immediately suggested that the author was Bill Clinton or Henry Kissinger. While I was raised in an unusual form of ethnic catholicism (not Roman), I have had just as many Jewish colleagues as Muslim given where I grew up and where I have lived since…

The problem with Rick Warren

Unless you're in a coma, you've probably heard that President-Elect Obama invited megachurch pastor Rick Warren to give the invocation at the inauguration. You've probably also heard that this decision has royally ticked off quite a few members of Obama's base. I'm not going to get into the political benefits or pitfalls of this decision. It's clear that Mr. Obama and his staff feel that the potential benefits sent by what they see as a message of inclusion outweigh the costs. That's clearly their call to make, and it would hardly be the first time that a politician has expended some…