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razib | September 6, 2006Janet has declared a "Nerd off." Here are two tales which made me reflect upon my nerdiness.
Once a friend and I mocked another friend because of their clumsy pipetting technique (he transferred volume like a girl! Oops, sorry Janet, that was a joke :-)
In a linear algebra study session I once made a joke which conflated 9-space with 3-space. Everyone laughed uproariously.
razib | September 3, 2006I love Thai peppers for their "fresh" flavor. The very hottest of these (according to the Scoville scale) overlap with the mildest of the Habenero. The Thai is spicy enough and slight enough that unlike the Serrano it never feels like you are a munching on a salad. My own particular favorite are the green Thai peppers, because though somewhat less spicy than their more ripe rich red cousins they impart a tangy aromatic flavor which fills out the heat with a richer taste. Also, unlike the Habenero the Thai is a small and compact package that you can keep on your side as you are downing the…
revere | September 2, 2006As a blogger, I'm apparently in the minority in more ways than one (I speak here as one of the Reveres and for myself only). A telephone survey done by the Pew Internet and American Life project estimates that half of bloggers are below the age of 30 (not me, alas), are interested in blogging as a form of self-expression (not me, alas), documenting personal experiences or sharing practical knowledge (not usually) or just keeping in touch with friends and family (like they read our blog, right?). More than half live in the suburbs (nope) and are equally split between men and women (the…
razib | August 30, 2006I stand with the other science bloggers in encouraging everyone to do what they can to oust the Creationist on the Ohio School Board. More from Ed Brayton, Chad, John, Bora, Kevin and Tara. If you lose enough small battles the big war is lost.
razib | August 30, 2006I noticed some blogs were talking about a new Pew Political Typology, and I decided to take their survey to see where I fit in. It said I was an Upbeat, which seemed wrong to me as I'm not that partisan (I voted for Kerry though my registration is Republican). So I took the Political Compass test, and I got my usual result:
Economic Left/Right: 2.13 (I'm fiscally conservative)
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -3.38 (I'm socially liberal)
I'm a moderate libertarian who leans toward the slightly more liberal side. My political intensity has been decreasing over the years, and I've probably…
razib | August 29, 2006To the right you see a habanero pepper, 100-350 K Scoville units (Jalapeno is 2.5-8 K). I can eat 2 habeneros in one sitting and enjoy it. And what does not kill you can cure cancer. Hot dog! On the other hand, if I want something which is a little less spicey and has a more tangy, aromatic flavor, I really enjoy green Thai peppers. I'm the spicey ScienceBlogger.
razib | August 29, 2006Check out the tour (taxonomy?) of the ScienceBlogs over at 3.14. There are promises of summaries of each SB (I assume I'll be the handsome ScienceBlogger!).
razib | August 26, 2006"...you know, Microsoft is like a cush government job."
-friend who is an ex-Microsoft employee.
"I just noticed in this year's update to Excel that they finally added that feature I worked on 10 years ago!"
-friend who is an ex-Microsoft employee.
razib | August 26, 2006In an entry below I offer that the citation of a Wikipedia reference is not reliable, and I can't take responsibility if someone changes the entry between my link and your click. I am not totally kidding, I "Wikipediaed" a semi-famous individual recently and the entry described him as a serial rapist. In broken English. Someone was obviously bored, or had a bad experience with this small time celeb. I quickly reedited it, but it sure brought home to me the problem with Wikipedia. But then I thought: could you, as a blogger, just reedit or write your own Wikipedia entries and then link to…
razib | August 25, 2006My post a few days ago about multiracial humans elicated many comments, and not all of them were flip or for amusement. There are some serious issues, like synergistic and antagonistic epistasis, which I would like to explore in the future. But, I think there are two primary "take home" points:
1) Aside from cases of problematic populations with recessive diseases (frankly, I think Ashkenazi Jews fall under this) the fitness benefit of outbreeding does not stand out so much as to be of great comment in the grand scheme of how you fix upon your one and only. I don't even think it really is…
razib | August 24, 2006Some of you know that I have been in a discussion with Right Reason about the relationship between Christianity and altruism. I will address in full this weekend when I have time many of Steve's arguments. Suffice it to say that I think he places more emphasis on the emergence and crystallization of ideas in texts than I do. But, I noted this this post over at The Inductivist which reports data from the World Values Survey:
Percent saying serving others is very important to them:
Top 10:
Puerto Rico 78.8
Morocco 67.8
Venezuela 67.7
Jordan 67.0
Mexico 63.6
Iran 62.1
Nigeria 62.0
Egypt 61.8…
razib | August 24, 2006Over the past two weeks I've avoided coffee. The main reason is that at my occupational habitat soft drinks are provided gratis, and I've been taking advantage of the opportunity to give my wallet a break. Additionally, the nearby coffee shop is a bit crowded both when I get to work, and during lunch, so walking over to the fridge has been the path of least resistance. But I was having some issues with a task at work which seemed (at the time) insoluble, so I caved and purchased a small 16 ounce coffee. As I put it to my mouth I was taken to a different, more affluent land, and as the odor…
razib | August 24, 2006Shellee asks:
"Are you for or against the death penalty, or (if its conditional), in what cases? Furthermore, do you believe that societies that sanction war are hypocritical for opposing the death penalty?"
There have been many good answers so far, though I'll leave it to Shellee to sum things up tomorrow.
Short answer:
I am opposed to the death penalty
I am not opposed to war
'
Longer answer:
My opposition to the death penalty is primarily pragmatic at this point. It is too expensive and riddled with problems in terms of the probability of killing someone innocent. Like laws against…
razib | August 24, 2006Over at my other blog I post 10 questions for Luigi Luca Cavalli-Sforza. If you are a genetics nut, what are you waiting for!?!?! Click! (unless you are the type bored by human population genetics) Now that you are back, there is one question that is relevant to the race debate that I had with John Wilkins a few months ago, and I've reposted it below, so reread it. You can make your own decision, but keep in mind that those who strongly reject race as a biological construct make a direct appeal to Cavalli-Sforza. And just to reward you loyal readers, I will tell you that we have another "…