education
gregladen | April 2, 2010First, there was plain and simple creationism, a Christian idea that, in an ideal Christian world, would be taught as part of any science dealing with the past, including biology (evolution), geology, and presumably history.
But the constitution stood in the way of implementing basic Christian teachings in public schools in the United States, though that battle took decades. Just as creationists were being driven off he landscape, a sort of Battle of the Bulge occurred, in the form of Intelligent Design.
Intelligent Design is a scientific-looking theory which is really just more creationism…
rallain | April 2, 2010The current push in our state is to improve college graduation rates. Who could argue that is a bad thing? Having more students succeed in college is a good thing. The problem is assessing the performance of the state universities by looking primarily at graduation rates. Why? Simply - if the goal is to just raise graduation rates, that is easy to do. Just make sure more students pass. Is this really what we want? I think not.
Louisiana Governor Ricky Bobby Jindal compared the poor graduation rates of the state universities to a football coach without a winning season hinting that you…
drorzel | April 2, 2010I forgot to schedule a blog post to remind people to tune in to my appearance on WAMC's "The Roundtable" yesterday morning, talking about How to Teach Physics to Your Dog. If you missed it, and have fourteen minutes to kill, they have the segment on their audio archive now.
It went well, and I had fun. I was really flattered when somebody at work asked if I'd gotten the questions in advance-- actually, I only got into the studio about three minutes before the interview started. Nice to see that a real radio studio looks pretty much like what you see on tv and in movies, only smaller, as is…
grrlscientist | April 2, 2010tags: Collared Scops-Owl, Otus lettia, birds, mystery bird, bird ID quiz
[Mystery bird] Collared Scops-Owl, Otus lettia, photographed on the Keoladeo National Park, Bharatpur, India. [I will identify this bird for you in 48 hours]
Image: Adrian White [larger view].
Nikon D40x with 70-300AF.
Please name at least one field mark that supports your identification.
Review all mystery birds to date.
rallain | April 1, 2010ZapperZ (at Physics and Physicists) recently had a post about Chad (from Uncertain Principles). It was sort of a review of Chad's book How to Teach Physics to Your Dog.
In this post, ZapperZ makes a very Feynman-like distinction between "teaching physics" and "teaching about physics". This is a really good point - that to learn physics you have to do physics. I completely agree. It is just like riding a bike - you have to ride a bike to learn to ride a bike.
So here is the question. What do I do here on this blog? I don't know. Do I talk about physics? Yes? I do not teach physics -…
grrlscientist | April 1, 2010tags: Short-billed Dowitcher, Limnodromus griseus, birds, mystery bird, bird ID quiz
[Mystery bird] Short-billed Dowitcher, Limnodromus griseus, photographed on Bolivar Peninsula, Galveston County, Texas. [I will identify this bird for you in 48 hours]
Image: Joseph Kennedy, March 2010 [larger view].
Nikon D200, Kowa 883 telescope with TSN-PZ camera eyepiece 1/750s f/8.0 at 1000.0mm iso400.
Please name at least one field mark that supports your identification.
Review all mystery birds to date.
gregladen | March 31, 2010Educating the poor is more than just a numbers game, says Shukla Bose. She tells the story of her groundbreaking Parikrma Humanity Foundation, which brings hope to India's slums by looking past the daunting statistics and focusing on treating each child as an individual.
Shukla Bose is the founder and head of the Parikrma Humanity Foundation, a nonprofit that runs four extraordinary schools for poor children.
The word "Parikrma" implies a full revolution, a complete path around -- and Shukla Bose's Parikrma Humanity Foundation offers literally that to kids in poor urban areas around Bangalore…
drorzel | March 31, 2010If you scroll way down the list of this year's Goldwater Scholarship winners, you'll find:
Peter John Bonventre
Institution: Union College
Major(s): Physics/Mathematics
Career Goal: Ph.D. in Mathematics or Physics. Conduct research and teach at the university level.
Pete's one of our junior physics majors. He's done summer work on both nuclear physics and condensed matter physics, and is a work-study student in the department. So, we're obviously thrilled to see him win. Congratulations, Pete!
There's a Goldwater Foundation press release here, with more information and statistics about the…
drorzel | March 31, 2010Physics Central is having a contest:
Do you love lasers? Ever wanted to unravel the mystery of the stimulated emission? Then the LaserFest video contest is for you. Take any laser you want and use it to somehow express a physics concept. Shine, lase, bounce and wave your way into physics history.
The winner will receive a trophy lovingly made by APS staff from some of our favorite laser toys as well as $1,000 cash. All entries must be received by May 16th at midnight.
If you know how to make videos for YouTube, and know something about physics, here's your chance at (Internet) fame and (…
grrlscientist | March 31, 2010tags: Purple Finch, Carpodacus purpureus, birds, mystery bird, bird ID quiz
[Mystery bird] Purple Finch, Carpodacus purpureus, photographed at the Perry Nature Area near Sioux Falls, South Dakota. [I will identify this bird for you in 48 hours]
Image: Terry Sohl, 21 March 2010 [larger view]. You are encouraged to purchase photographs from this photographer. I am happy to email his contact information to you.
Canon 50D, 400 5.6L.
Please name at least one field mark that supports your identification.
Review all mystery birds to date.
jdupuis | March 31, 2010From the April Communications of the ACM, the Kode Vicious column is on The Data-Structure Canon.
The reader question is:
In most areas of science there are a few basic underlying laws that inform the rest of the study of a given subject. Physics, chemistry, and electrical engineering all have these basic equations. What are the basic equations in computer science? Or is computer science baseless?
In other words, what's the fundamental intellectual basis of computer science? Well, according to KV, it's data structures!
If there were any set of basics that I wanted to hammer into software…
grrlscientist | March 31, 2010tags: education, public outreach, SciCafe, science cafe, AMNH, American Museum of Natural History, NYC, streaming video
Who: Kristin Baldwin, Assistant Professor at Scripps Research's Department of Cell Biology
What: free public presentation, "The Future of Stem Cells"
When: Wednesday, 7 April at 700pm
Where: Gottesman Hall of Planet Earth, American Museum of Natural History, Enter at the 81st Street (Rose Center) [directions and maps]
Cost: FREE, and there is a cash bar too! (must be 21+ with ID)
What if your cells could be engineered to grow your own replacement organs? Glimpse the…
jdupuis | March 30, 2010The second Book Camp TO is coming up in about 6 weeks or so: Saturday, May 15, 2010 from 9:00 AM - 5:00 PM.
Last year's edition was terrific and I'm really looking forward to another great conference.
What's it about?
What: BookCampTO is a free unconference about the future of books, reading, writing and publishing. Ebooks have arrived, and with them great changes are afoot. BoomCampTO 2010 will focus on what happens next, how this big shift to digital is changing different parts of the book business, and how we are adapting. Our focus is not so much on ebooks as everything else.
When:…
grrlscientist | March 30, 2010tags: Red-bellied Woodpecker, Melanerpes carolinus, birds, mystery bird, bird ID quiz
[Mystery bird] Red-bellied Woodpecker, Melanerpes carolinus, photographed in the photographer's back yard in Houston, Texas. [I will identify this bird for you in 48 hours]
Image: Joseph Kennedy, March 2010 [larger view].
Nikon D200, Kowa 883 telescope with TSN-PZ camera eyepiece 1/640s f/8.0 at 1000.0mm iso400.
Please name at least one field mark that supports your identification.
Review all mystery birds to date.
grrlscientist | March 29, 2010tags: Laysan Teal, Laysan Duck, Anas laysanensis, birds, mystery bird, bird ID quiz
[Mystery bird] Laysan Duck, also known as the Laysan Teal, Anas laysanensis, photographed on Midway Atoll National Wildlife Refuge, Midway Island, Hawai'i. [I will identify this bird for you in 48 hours]
Image: Joe Fuhrman, March 2010 [larger view].
NOTE: Unless you are a beginning bird watcher, PLEASE wait 24 hours before identifying this bird. (Intermediate-expert birders are encouraged to use puns, anagrams, poetry references or citations, Monty Python quotes or anything else that tickles your fancy to…
grrlscientist | March 29, 2010tags: Alex Filippenko, Josh Frieman, FermiLab, astronomy, astrophysics, Science Bulletins, research, American Museum of Natural History, AMNH, New York City, space, nature, universe, The Expanding Universe, streaming video
In 1998, astrophysicists discovered a baffling phenomenon: the Universe is expanding at an ever-faster rate. Either an enigmatic force called dark energy is to blame or a reworking of gravitational theory is in order. In this new Science Bulletins video, watch a FermiLab team assemble the Dark Energy Camera, a device that could finally solve this space-stretching mystery…
grrlscientist | March 28, 2010tags: marshmallow peeps, Astropeep, peeponaut, easter, space, humor, funny, silly, video, streaming video
I posted this last year, but I think it is worth repeating .. this streaming video lacks music, but it shows you the adventures of a very special marshmallow peep, an astropeep (or a peeponaut, depending upon which name you prefer) who traveled to the edge of space .. thanks to the Adler Planetarium's "Far Horizons 12" high altitude balloon mission, which rose to nearly to 97,000 feet.
grrlscientist | March 28, 2010tags: Cape Thick-Knee, Spotted Dikkop, Spotted Thick-Knee, Burhinus capensis, birds, mystery bird, bird ID quiz
[Mystery bird] Spotted Thick-Knee, also known as the Cape Thick-Knee or the Spotted Dikkop, Burhinus capensis, photographed in the Serengeti National Park, Tanzania, Africa. [I will identify this bird for you in 48 hours]
Image: Dan Logen, 18 January 2010 [larger view].
Nikon D300, 600 mm VR lens with 1.4 extender. ISO 400, 1/1600 sec, f/6.3. Exposure compensation -1.3.
Please name at least one field mark that supports your identification.
Review all mystery birds to date…
bioephemera | March 28, 2010Doesn't that title sound weird - like an experimental film? It may help to know that House of Sweden is Sweden's embassy in Washington, DC - a lovely glass building on the Potomac. If you're in the DC area, you should get on their mailing list, because they host interesting science-related panel discussions and receptions. Yesterday, they opened a new exhibit - the Virtual Autopsy Table. It's a touch-screen tabletop that lets you slice into, rotate, and magnify an MRI-based 3D representation of the human body, all with a brush of a hand:
The Virtual Autopsy Table from Norrkö…
grrlscientist | March 28, 2010tags: T-Shirts That God Would Wear!, religion, cults, comedy, humor, funny, silly, fucking hilarious, Edward Current, streaming video
As a believer in the Prosperity Gospel, Edward Current prayed for abundance in his bank account. Here's what God -- and his accountant -- told him to do. Better yet, Jeebuz is helping out by pimping his new T-Shirts to the public!
For the record, Edward Current doesn't even know I exist, and I do not get any rewards for placing this ad here -- not even a lousy free t-shirt! That said, I DO know what I want for my Easter gifts, and they ain't armies chocolate…