jlynch | May 22, 2007
You’ll probably have noticed that I have returned from Boston and the Marine Biological Laboratory at Woods Hole (above, looking across Eel Pond on the day before it started raining … a lot) where I was for a break with friends and a workshop for the past eleven days or so. Fun was had and perhaps I’ll post on the workshop (theme: “What is the Value of History of Science for Science?”) later. I will say that I met a Nobel Prize winner, ate great seafood, drank great beer, and talked history and philosophy of science with good friends into the wee hours.
Blogging will be sporadic for a week…
jlynch | May 22, 2007
Today is the International Day for World Biodiversity, a favorite holiday of the Bush White House.
Events
1906 - Wright brothers are granted patent number 821,393 for their "Flying-Machine".
1969 - Apollo 10's lunar module flies within 8.4 nautical miles (16 km) of the moon's surface.
Births
1911 - Anatol Rapoport, Russian-born mathematical psychologist, and pianist
1912 - Herbert C. Brown, English-born chemist, Nobel Prize laureate
1920 - Thomas Gold, Austrian astrophysicist
1927 - George Andrew Olah, Hungarian-born chemist, Nobel Prize laureate
Deaths
1666 - Gaspar Schott, German scientist…
jlynch | May 22, 2007Headline at Uncommon Descent:
The Chronicle says of Gonzalez "a clear case of discrimination"
Actual sentence in Chronicle article:
At first glance, it seems like a clear-cut case of discrimination. (emphasis mine)
Wow. Just, wow.
jlynch | May 9, 2007This evening was the convocation for our honors students and featured the largest graduating class ever from our College. Tomorrow I prepare to head off to Woods Hole for the MBL-ASU History of Biology Seminar. While I will have access to the Intertubes while there, I'm going to probably take a break from blogging, recharge, and figure out what I want to do over the summer break. In short, I'll be back online after the 20th.
jlynch | May 8, 2007Births
1927 - Manfred Eigen, German biophysicist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry
Deaths
1931 - Albert Abraham Michelson, German-born physicist, Nobel Prize laureate
1950 - Esteban Terradas i Illa, Catalan mathematician, scientist, and engineer
jlynch | May 7, 2007
Ah, makes you want to move to Alaska, doesn't it. (Courtesy of this Fark thread).
jlynch | May 7, 2007Events
1794 - Branded a traitor during the Reign of Terror by revolutionists, French chemist Antoine Lavoisier, who was also a tax collector with the Ferme Générale, was tried, convicted, and guillotined all on one day in Paris.
Births
1842 - Emil Christian Hansen, Danish physiologist
1859 - Johan Jensen, Danish mathematician
1902 - Andre Michael Lwoff, Nobel laureate
1947 - H. Robert Horvitz, Nobel laureate
Deaths
1788 - Giovanni Antonio Scopoli, Italian-born physician and naturalist
1794 - Antoine Lavoisier, French chemist
1960 - J. H. C. Whitehead, British mathematician
jlynch | May 6, 2007Events
1895 - Alexander Stepanovich Popov demonstrates the first radio receiver.
1952 - The concept for the integrated circuit, the basis for all modern computers, is first published by Geoffrey W.A. Dummer.
Births
1896 - Pavel Sergeevich Alexandrov, Russian mathematician
1939 - Sidney Altman, Canadian molecular biologist, Nobel laureate
Deaths
1617 - David Fabricius, German astronomer
1941 - Sir James George Frazer, Scottish anthropologist
jlynch | May 5, 2007Births
1769 - Jean Nicolas Pierre Hachette, French mathematician
1856 - Sigmund Freud, Austrian psychiatrist
1871 - Victor Grignard, Chemist and Nobel Prize laureate
1872 - Willem de Sitter, Dutch scientist
1916 - Robert H. Dicke, American physicist
1929 - Paul Lauterbur, Nobel laureate in Physiology or Medicine.
Deaths
1859 - Alexander von Humboldt, German naturalist and explorer
1951 - Ãlie Cartan, French mathematician
1963 - Theodore von Kármán, Hungarian-born physicist
jlynch | May 5, 2007
I used to be a semi-serious birdwatcher back in Ireland. When I came to the US, I (for some unknown reason) didn't keep up the hobby and have only in the past year begun keeping track of the species I see (and even then only sporadically). Today, I saw a pair of Zone Tailed Hawks (Buteo albonotatus) ... making 100 species since I began to keep count.
jlynch | May 5, 2007I'm sure PZ will comment on this, but I couldn't help but highlight this statement by George Gilder:
The notion that "the whole universe contains no intelligence," Mr. Gilder said at Thursday's conference, is perpetuated by "Darwinian storm troopers."
"Both Nazism and communism were inspired by Darwinism," he continued. "Why conservatives should toady to these storm troopers is beyond me."
Way to go George! And his sock puppet, John West, once more tells us what the real agenda is:
"Nor is it simply an irrelevant rehashing of certain esoteric points of biology and philosophy. Darwinian…
jlynch | May 4, 2007
Events
1925 - John T. Scopes (above) is served an arrest warrant in violation of the Butler Act.
1961 - Mercury program: Mercury-Redstone 3 - Alan Shepard becomes the first American to travel into space, making a sub-orbital flight of 15 minutes.
Births
1921 - Arthur Leonard Schawlow, American physicist, Nobel Prize laureate
Deaths
1808 - Pierre Jean George Cabanis, French physiologist
1859 - Peter Gustav Dirichlet, German mathematician
1892 - August Wilhelm von Hofmann, German chemist
jlynch | May 3, 2007
Events
1675 - King Charles II of England orders the construction of the Royal Greenwich Observatory.
Births
1733 - Jean-Charles de Borda, French mathematician, physicist, political scientist, and sailor
1825 - Thomas Henry Huxley, English scientist (above)
Deaths
1566 - Luca Ghini, Italian physician and botanist
1615 - Adriaan van Roomen, Flemish mathematician
1677 - Isaac Barrow, English mathematician
1859 - Joseph Diaz Gergonne, French mathematician
1972 - Edward Calvin Kendall, American chemist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine
jlynch | May 3, 2007
As an ex-student of mine remarked, "It's as though Pakistan lost a highly radioactive family pet." All very weird. More details here.
[Tip O' The Hat to Bryant K.]
jlynch | May 2, 2007Births
1713 - Alexis Clairault, French mathematician
1768 - Charles Tennant, Scottish chemist and industrialist
1860 - John Scott Haldane, Scottish physiologist
1860 - Vito Volterra, Italian mathematician
1874 - V. Walfrid Ekman, Swedish oceanographer
1892 - George Paget Thomson, English physicist, Nobel Prize laureate
1902 - Alfred Kastler, French physicist, Nobel Prize laureate
1905 - Werner Fenchel, German mathematician
1933 - Steven Weinberg, American physicist, Nobel Prize laureate
Deaths
1779 - John Winthrop, American astronomer
1988 - Lev Semenovich Pontryagin, Russian…
jlynch | May 1, 2007Births
1802 - Heinrich Gustav Magnus, German chemist and physicist
1939 - Sumio Iijima, Japanese physicist
Deaths
1683 - Stjepan GradiÄ, Croatian philosopher and scientist
1927 - Ernest Starling, British physiologist
1979 - Giulio Natta, Italian chemist, Nobel Prize laureate
1997 - John Carew Eccles, Australian neurophysiologist, Nobel laureate
jlynch | April 30, 2007And since "mission" is "accomplished" -
Terrorist attacks worldwide shot up more than 25 percent last year, killing 40 percent more people than in 2005, particularly in Iraq where extremists used chemical weapons and suicide bombers to target crowds, the State Department said Monday.
(source)
jlynch | April 30, 2007
Four years ago on this day, Bush declared that "major combat operations in Iraq have ended."
In the following three years, over 2,150 US troops died. That's ~716 per year.
On this day last year, Scott McClellan, when asked whether the mission has been accomplished, replied "We are on the way to accomplishing the mission and achieving victory."
In the past 365 days, a further 946 soldiers have died, bringing the total to 3344.
We're on the way to something ... victory ain't it.