jlynch | November 6, 2007Is anyone surprised?
Programs that focus exclusively on abstinence have not been shown to affect teenager sexual behavior, although they are eligible for tens of millions of dollars in federal grants, according to a study released by a nonpartisan group that seeks to reduce teen pregnancies.
"At present there does not exist any strong evidence that any abstinence program delays the initiation of sex, hastens the return to abstinence or reduces the number of sexual partners" among teenagers, the study concluded.
The report, which was based on a review of research into teenager sexual behavior…
jlynch | November 6, 2007Events
1996 - NASA launches the Mars Global Surveyor.
Births
1818 - Emil du Bois-Reymond, German physician
1867 - Maria Sklodowska-Curie, Polish-born chemist, physicist and Nobel Prize laureate (twice)
1878 - Lise Meitner, Austrian/American chemist, physicist and Nobel Prize laureate
1888 - C. V. Raman, Indian physicist and Nobel Prize laureate
1903 - Konrad Lorenz, Austrian zoologist and Nobel Prize laureate
1915 - Philip Morrison, American scientist
1929 - Eric R. Kandel, Austrian-born neuroscientist and Nobel Prize laureate
Deaths
1599 - Gasparo Tagliacozzi, Italian surgeon
1913 -…
jlynch | November 5, 2007Events
1935 - Edwin Armstrong presents his paper "A Method of Reducing Disturbances in Radio Signaling by a System of Frequency Modulation."
Deaths
1771 - John Bevis, English physician and astronomer
1822 - Claude Louis Berthollet, French chemist
1964 - Hans von Euler-Chelpin, German-born chemist and Nobel Prize laureate
jlynch | November 5, 2007Back from the History of Science Society meeting in DC (well, Crystal City, Virginia actually). Session went well and it was good to catch up with old friends, though watching ASU lose to Oregon wasn't pleasant. Next few days will be busy catching up, but I'll get posting soon (I hope).
jlynch | October 31, 2007I’m off for the History of Science Society annual meeting in DC for the next few days, so posting will be scant or non-existent. I’m responding to a series of papers on Victorian critics of scientific naturalism and attending the Committee on Education annual meeting.
Today is your last chance to donate to our DonorsChoose drive. If you haven’t done so already, please considering donating. I’ll give a round-up when I return.
Births
1835 - Adolf von Baeyer, German chemist and Nobel Prize laureate
1925 - John Pople, English chemist and Nobel Prize laureate
1943 - Paul Frampton, English…
jlynch | October 30, 2007Births
1844 - Harvey W. Wiley, American chemist
1847 - Galileo Ferraris, Italian physicist
1857 - Georges Gilles de la Tourette, French neurologist
1894 - Jean Rostand, French biologist
1895 - Gerhard Domagk, German bacteriologist and Nobel Prize laureate (declined)
1895 - Dickinson W. Richards, American physician and Nobel Prize laureate
1900 - Ragnar Granit Finnish neuroscientist and Nobel Prize laureate
1907 - Sol Tax, American anthropologist
1928 - Daniel Nathans, American microbiologist and Nobel Prize laureate
1939 - Leland H. Hartwell, American scientist, and Nobel Prize laureate…
jlynch | October 29, 2007
This is so cool. A one-millimeter long spider (Cenotextricella simoni) encased in amber gets "digitally dissected" using Very High Resolution X-Ray Computed Tomography. The paper is online in Zootaxa 1623:47-53 but requires a subscription.
jlynch | October 29, 2007Only three more days left for us to meet our challenge. So far we've only hit 34% of our goal and have raised $1,358 which will help 266 students.
I've added some new proposals to our slate in the hope that if you weren't interested before, you can now find a proposal that you like. You know what to do ...
jlynch | October 29, 2007
Events
1991 - The American Galileo spacecraft makes its closest approach to 951 Gaspra (above), becoming the first probe to visit an asteroid.
Births
1656 (O.S.) - Edmond Halley, English astronomer
1827 - Marcellin Berthelot, French chemist
1880 - Abram Ioffe, Soviet physicist
1915 - William Berenberg, American physician
1920 - Baruj Benacerraf, Venezuelan-born immunologist and Nobel Prize laureate
1923 - Carl Djerassi, Austrian chemist
Deaths
1932 - Joseph BabiÅski, Polish-French neurologist
1933 - Albert Calmette, French physician
1971 - Arne Tiselius, Swedish chemist and Nobel…
jlynch | October 28, 2007Births
1845 - Zygmunt Florenty Wróblewski, Polish physicist
1912 - Richard Doll, English epidemiologist
1914 - Richard Laurence Millington Synge, British biochemist and Nobel Prize laureate
Deaths
1792 - Paul Möhring, German physician and scientist
1841 - Johan August Arfwedson, Swedish chemist
1877 - Robert Swinhoe, British naturalist
1957 - Ernst Gräfenberg, German physician and scientist
2005 - Richard Smalley, American chemist and Nobel Prize laureate
jlynch | October 28, 2007You are down 13-0 at the end of the first quarter. Down 20-14 at the half. And win the game 31-20. You are ASU playing Cal on Homecoming night in Tempe.
An amazing game saw the Devils go 8-0 and capture the lead in the Pac-10. Two appalling calls by the referees in the first half made life more difficult than it should have been, but overall it was a typical ASU game - let the opposition get ahead in the first half, crush them in the second; we’ve out-scored opponents 153-29 in the second half this season. As Cal coach Jeff Tedford noted, "[ASU] are a great football team and they came out and…
jlynch | October 27, 2007Big game tonight with #21 Cal coming to town for Homecoming to take on the #4 Sun Devils. With #5 Oregon defeating USC 24-17, tonight’s game will be huge for the Pac10 and the BCS standings.
More later.
jlynch | October 27, 2007Stanford University Hospital is reporting that Arthur Kornberg, the 1959 Nobel Laureate in Physiology or Medicine, has died aged 89. Kornberg received recognition for his discovery of "the mechanisms in the biological synthesis of deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA)". His son, Roger, received his own Nobel (Chemistry) last year.
jlynch | October 27, 2007Events
1961 - NASA launched the first Saturn I rocket in Mission Saturn-Apollo 1.
Births
1951 - Carlos Frenk, Mexican/British cosmologist
Deaths
1449 - Ulugh Beg, Timurid ruler and astronomer
1968 - Lise Meitner, German physicist
1980 - John Hasbrouck van Vleck, American physicist and Nobel Prize laureate
1992 - David Bohm, American-born physicist, philosopher, and neuropsychologist
1999 - Robert Mills, American physicist
jlynch | October 26, 2007
on the fire suicides of the buddhists "They only burn themselves to reach Paradise." Mme. Nhu original courage is good, motivation be damned, and if you say they are trained to feel no pain, are they guaranteed this? is is still not possible to die for somebody else?
you sophisticates who lay back and make statements of explanation I have seen the red rose burning and this means more.
Charles Bukowski.
Thanks to my student Devon for passing this one on to me.
jlynch | October 25, 2007Events
1977 - The last natural case of smallpox was discovered in Merca district, Somalia. The WHO and the CDC consider this date the anniversary of the eradication of smallpox.
1984 - "Baby Fae" receives a heart transplant from a baboon.
1994 - Announcement that Andrew Wiles correctly proved Fermat’s last theorem.
Births
1874 - Martin Lowry, British chemist
Deaths
1817 - Nikolaus Joseph von Jacquin, Austrian scientist
1943 - Marc Aurel Stein, Hungarian-born archaeologist
1957 - Gerty Cori, Nobel Prize laureate
1989 - Charles J. Pedersen, American chemist and Nobel Prize laureate
jlynch | October 25, 2007Births
1856 - Dragutin Gorjanovic-Kramberger, Croatian paleontologist
1910 - William Higinbotham, American physicist
Deaths
1647 - Evangelista Torricelli, Italian physicist and mathematician
jlynch | October 24, 2007Over at Page 3.14, there’s a post where us old farts reminisce about computing when we were young ’uns. I’m quoted as saying
"My first computer was a ZX81 (Timex/Sinclair here in the US). Had 1k of memory. Taught myself assembly.
In high school and college, virtually everything was hand written. Didn’t even use a calculator until college (wasn’t allowed in high school - I remember log tables!)"
Below the fold, I give some more reminiscences. Gentle reader, feel free to add your memories as comments.
These are somewhat free-form and disjointed ...
My first computer was a ZX81 (Timex/…
jlynch | October 23, 2007Events
1998 - Launch of the Deep Space 1 mission
Births
1804 - Wilhelm Eduard Weber, German physicist
1932 - Pierre-Gilles de Gennes, French physicist and Nobel Prize laureate
Deaths
1601 - Tycho Brahe, Danish astronomer