Eureka
drorzel | December 10, 2014The final step of the scientific process is to share your results with others, and that's the step where things are most prone to breaking down. Countless great discoveries have been delayed or temporarily lost because the people who made them were more concerned with protecting "their" secrets than with sharing new knowledge with the world. A classic example of this, that I first heard from Michael Nielsen, is Robert Hooke in 1676 first reporting the relationship for elastic forces as "ceiiinossssttuv," which unscrambles to "ut tensio, sic vis," indicating that the force is proportional to…
drorzel | December 10, 2014So, you've picked up your copy of the just-released Eureka: Discovering Your Inner Scientist-- you have bought a copy, right?-- and now you're thinking "I'd love to curl up and read this, but what should I listen to while I do that?"
Well, never fear, I'm here to help. Also, I'm really tired, and this seems like a quick and easy blog post... Anyway, here are some of the crucial records involved in the making of this book.
1) Teeth Dreams by the Hold Steady This was probably the most crucial album of the lot, because it came out just at the time I needed to power through a whole bunch of edits…
drorzel | December 9, 2014Today is the official release date for Eureka: Discovering Your Inner Scientist, so of course there are a bunch of exciting things happening:
-- There's a short excerpt at the Science of Us blog from New York Magazine. This is a chunk of the Introduction, about how scientists are smart, but not that smart.
-- I wrote a Big Idea essay at Whatever, talking about how this book is about the BIGGEST idea in the history of humanity. Which is only a tiny bit of hyperbole.
-- Rosemary Kirstein included Eureka as a gift suggestion, which is very cool, as she writes awesome books. You should check them…
drorzel | December 9, 2014
I tooke a bodkine gh & put it betwixt my eye & [the] bone as neare to [the] backside of my eye as I could: & pressing my eye [with the] end of it (soe as to make [the] curvature a, bcdef in my eye) there appeared severall white darke & coloured circles r, s, t, &c. Which circles were plainest when I continued to rub my eye [with the] point of [the] bodkine, but if I held my eye & [the] bodkin still, though I continued to presse my eye [with] it yet [the] circles would grow faint & often disappeare untill I removed [them] by moving my eye or [the] bodkin.
If [the…
drorzel | December 9, 2014Copies of Eureka: Discovering Your Inner Scientist have been turning up in the wild for a while now, but the officially official release date is today (available from Amazon, Barnes and Noble, IndieBound, Powell’s, and anywhere else books are sold). To mark that, here's some stuff I wrote about the core message of the book, presented in Internet-friendly listicle form:
Eight Things You Need to Know About Science
1) Everybody Is a Scientist: Most people picture scientists as remote eggheads, who think in ways that ordinary people can’t comprehend, but the reality is very different. Scientists…
drorzel | December 8, 2014This entry doesn't have a fictionalized story both because I'm on vacation, and because I don't think there's a single dramatic turning point in this particular story. It's probably one of the most impressive human accomplishments of the last umpteen thousand years, though, and definitely deserves a place in any rundown of wonders of science. I'm speaking, of course, of corn.
To a modern American, of course, corn (or "maize" if you want to sound European) doesn't seem especially impressive or scientific, but it ranks as a great accomplishment because of where it came from. Which, as far as we…
drorzel | December 7, 2014Following on yesterday's story of transformative discoveries starting by accident, we'll jump from the Middle East to the Far East for the probably apocryphal story of the Empress Leizu (also sometimes referred to as Xi Lingshi) who is credited with the discovery of silk around 2600 BCE. One of the many versions of the story has it that she was drinking tea in her garden, and a silkworm coccoon fell into her tea. When she poked at it to get it out of the hot water, the thread unraveled, and she became fascinated with it.
From there, her experiments with silk threads and silkworms led her to…
drorzel | December 6, 2014
Borne of the flowing water (...)
Tenderly cared for by the Ninhursag,
Borne of the flowing water (...)
Tenderly cared for by the Ninhursag,
Having founded your town by the sacred lake,
She finished its great walls for you,
Ninkasi, having founded your town by the sacred lake,
She finished its great walls for you
Your father is Enki, Lord Nidimmud,
Your mother is Ninti, the queen of the sacred lake,
Ninkasi, Your father is Enki, Lord Nidimmud,
Your mother is Ninti, the queen of the sacred lake.
You are the one who handles the dough,
[and] with a big shovel,
Mixing in a pit, the bappir with…
drorzel | December 5, 2014
"More wine?"
"Hmm? Oh, yes, thank you. Sorry, I was--"
"Thinking about mathematics, I wager. Prime numbers was it?"
"No, just distracted. It's this blasted heat."
"It is the longest day of the year."
"Yes, but normally not so hot."
"Especially here. You think this is hot, visit me in Syene sometime. You think it gets hot here... You would melt in Syene in the summer."
"So I hear. I suppose it's the moderating influence of the ocean that keeps us cooler."
"That, and we're closer to the Sun."
"What?"
"It's true. Today in Syene, the Sun will be directly overhead at mid-day, while you still have…
drorzel | December 5, 2014A couple of quick updates on Eureka publicity, as we get on a plane today to take the kids to Florida for the weekend:
-- APS News has an excerpt from the chapter on collecting hobbies. This is kind of choppy, obviously cut down to meet a word count limit of some sort, but it gets the basic flavor across.
-- I'll be appearing on KERA radio's "Think" on Wednesday December 10 from 12-1 Central time (1-2pm Eastern). This will be a live interview, possibly including call-in questions.
-- I'll be on WAMC's Roundtable on December 19; I don't have the exact time yet, but will update when I get that…
drorzel | December 4, 2014
The southeastern sky had been lightening for some time, stars slowly fading away. Off to the west, a band of clouds was moving in, obscuring stars as it came, but they wouldn't make it in time to block the sunrise. A good thing, as the last two dawns had been cloudy. There would be maybe two more chances this year to see if everything worked, then another full turn of the seasons before their next chance.
She sat on the cold ground, behind the offering bowls, a bit off the line of the main passage. She was inside the ring of posts marking the final perimeter, but outside what would become…
drorzel | December 3, 2014
The fungal tea tastes vile, and not for the first time he considers dumping it on the last of the morning's fire. It does seem to be helping the pain in his gut, though, as the medicine man said it would, so he gulps the last of it with a grimace. Around him the younger members of the raiding party are packing up the camp, making ready to head higher up the mountain.
He checks the head of his axe, out of habit, making sure the copper blade is still sharp and securely fixed. Not that he had much doubt-- he had shaped it himself, and it would take more than chopping wood for last night's fire…
drorzel | December 2, 2014 A few smallish items regarding Eureka: Discovering Your Inner Scientist:
-- I'll be doing a signing at the Open Door bookstore in Schenectady next Sunday, the 14th, from 12-1:30. The Open door is one of the kids' favorite spots, as it's right outside the Sunday market we go to every week, so this is fun. Last time I did a signing there, they had a couple of copies for me to sign from people who couldn't make it, so if you'd like a signed copy, you could give them a call, and see what they can do.
(No other bookstore appearances scheduled right at the moment, but if you'd like me to come…
drorzel | December 2, 2014
She kneels on the dirt and watches the elder study the rocks she brought. Five fist-sized chunks of red stone, laboriously hacked from an outcrop. Half a day walking there and back, and half a day pounding rocks against rocks to yield this offering.
The elder's hands are stained the same red as the stone, from years of grinding and mixing the paint that is her people's sign. Behind him in the cave, she can see others banging, grinding, and mixing. The summer festivals are coming soon, and a great deal of paint will be needed. He turns her rocks round and round, studying all sides.
Finally,…
drorzel | December 1, 2014
"...and unless the King comes here himself, I'm not to be disturbed."
"Yes, of course." The servant bowed out, leaving him alone with the bath. He stepped in, gingerly at first, the water almost too hot to stand. Slowly, he lowered himself down to a sitting position, feeling the heat soak into his tired legs. All day, on his feet, running back and forth, making tests and fending off royal messengers. The gods curse obsessive kings and greedy goldsmiths.
He sighed, as the hot water began to ease individual aches that had long since run together as one big knot of pain. More than the bath,…
drorzel | December 1, 2014Almost everybody, regardless of what side they favor in the culture wars, knows that Charles Darwin was the first scientist to come up with the theory of evolution. At least, they think they do. In fact, lots of people had the general idea long before Darwin, including his own grandfather. We remember Darwin not because he was first, but because he made the strongest case, thanks in large part to that most basic of hobbies, stamp collecting.
While Eureka: Discovering Your Inner Scientist has been sighted in the wild, the official release date isn't until next week. So, if you're still waiting…
drorzel | November 17, 2014The first time you hear about dark matter, it sounds kind of crazy-- asserting that we're surrounded by tons of invisible stuff is usually a good way to get locked up. But the process of its discovery is surprisingly ordinary: it's just what you do when you play cards.
Here's the second green-screen video I've done to promote Eureka: Discovering Your Inner Scientist, which comes out three weeks from tomorrow (but can be pre-ordered today!). This one is about card games, modern astrophysics, and why you probbaly shouldn't play bridge against Vera Rubin:
For those who dislike video, I'll put…
drorzel | November 16, 2014I've been quieter than usual here, partly because I've been crushingly busy, but primarily because most of the things I want to talk about, I can't. Not yet, anyway. But I'm still alive, and this murderous term will be over soon, at which point blogging will pick up a bit.
I will throw in a quick teaser for something coming up in the future, though, by way of a thank-you to the folks at Schaffer Library who let me take some photos of the rare books collection:
An 1845 edition of "Vestiges of the Natural History of Creation," published anonymously but now known to be the work od Robert…
drorzel | November 10, 2014My new book comes out one month from yesterday, or four weeks from tomorrow. Of course, yesterday was Sunday, and tomorrow's a federal holiday, both lousy times for promotional posts, so I'll drop this in today instead. Here's a promotional video I put together, about how the history of quantum mechanics can be compared to working a crossword puzzle:
This is basically the talk I gave at TED@NYC last year, done in front of a green screen with slides edited in behind me for that An Inconvenient Truth vibe (Nobel committee, take note...). With some bonus cute kid photos and an explicit…
drorzel | October 4, 2014The exciting news of the week: Eureka: Discovering Your Inner Scientist has gotten a starred review in Publishers Weekly. Woo-hoo!
They've said nice things about my previous two books, but getting the star is a big deal. And it's a really good capsule description of the book, with a great pull quote in the last sentence:
This fun, diverse, and accessible look at how science works will convert even the biggest science phobe.
Really, I can't ask for better than that.
I found out this was coming at the end of last week, where it was an absolute life-saver after some sanity-threatening stuff…