Museums etc.
mikethemadbiologist | June 3, 2011
If you're in Boston this weekend, you should visit the Boston Public Library's Civil War exhibits. While several exhibits will be open only during weekday business hours, the Torn in Two: The 150th Anniversary of the Civil War exhibit is fantastic. There's also a really good exhibit of Homer Winslow Civil War era prints, largely done for newspapers (9am - 5pm, Mon., Wed., and Fri.; 9am - 7pm Tues. and Thurs.).
Both are superb.
mikethemadbiologist | February 3, 2011Recently, I claimned nothing in movement conservatism makes sense except in the light of creationism. One example is Paul Krugman's recent observation:
It's kind of shocking if you think about it. Here we have a huge, hard-won intellectual achievement [the recognition that depressions are caused by inadequate demand], one that accounts very well for the world we actually see, and yet it's being thrown away because it doesn't go along with ideological preconceptions. Once that sort of thing starts, where does it stop? The next thing you know, the theory of evolution will get the same…
mikethemadbiologist | January 27, 2011By way of Jonathan Eisen, we discover that museums are starting to hire microbiology curators. I'm very excited about this, probably more excited than Eisen (and he's a pretty excitable guy). In part, I've always loved museums and have thought that building microbiological collections for museums would be a neat thing to do. But there are also some vital scientific needs that would be met by museum curation.
What makes microbiological curation really exciting to me is the advent of cheap genomic methods. If you're able to culture it, we can sequence its genome, which is a pretty good way…
mikethemadbiologist | November 15, 2010Last night, I went to the spanking brand new Art of the Americas Wing at Boston's Museum of Fine Arts. I can't recommend it highly enough. It's a beautiful space. If you're a regular denizen of the MFA, you've probably seen some of the pieces on temporary exhibit, but it's great to see them enter permanent displays.
I'll also add that if the MFA were to stay open late Sunday evenings, that would be fantastic. It put me in a really good mood for the week.
If you're not a member, you'll have to wait until next Saturday, when it's open to the general public. If you join while at the museum…
mikethemadbiologist | September 25, 2010One is in Boston, the other in D.C. In Boston, the Boston Public Library has an amazing collection of travel posters from the 1920s to the 1950s. Here's one:
If you can't visit it, there's an online gallery.
In D.C., the Smithsonian Natural History Museum has an exhibit about how the Natural History Museum has changed over the last 100 years. The exhibits have changed a little since these days:
If you can't visit, there's a pretty cool interactive before-and-after online feature too.
mikethemadbiologist | April 2, 2010The Smithsonian recently revamped its exhibit on human evolution, and the brand new Hall of Human Origins is definitely worth seeing. Unlike exhibits from the Small era, there is no equivocation here: humans evolved over millions of years from primates. Period. There's no ambiguity, no attempt to please theopolitical conservatives. It's also very aesthetically pleasing--the bronze statues of various hominid ancestors are amazing. If the rest of the planned renovations hit this mark, the Smithsonian will look amazing in a few years.
The exhibit also is pitched at different levels, and…
mikethemadbiologist | February 19, 2010There's an ongoing exhibit of photographer Jules Aarons' work at the Boston Public Library, "Man in the Street: Boston Photographs by Jules Aarons" that is worth seeing. From the BPL blurb:
In 1997, the Boston Public Library began collecting the work of Boston photographer Jules Aarons (1921-2008),and the library now holds the largest public collection of the photographer's work in the world. When Jules Aarons began photographing seriously in 1947, he chose the streets and neighborhoods of Boston as his subject. He was drawn to the way people in the neighborhoods lived their public lives and…
mikethemadbiologist | September 26, 2009...make sure you check out the Darwin exhibit and the ant exhibit at the National Museum of Natural History. The Darwin exhibit (TEH DARWINISMZ!!) has a really good introduction to natural selection that's readily accessible for non-biologists--I hope school trips take advantage of this exhibit and visit it (TEH EVOLUTIONISMZ!!). The ant exhibit has some amazing pictures, as well as a pretty cool leafcutter colony.
mikethemadbiologist | September 13, 2009Economist Brad DeLong criticizes an economics reporter from ProPublica who claims "his job is looking for 'gotcha' stories about stimulus money going for 'lion cages at the National Zoo.'" In DeLong's comments, I asked:
What's wrong with lion cages at the National Zoo? I like the National Zoo, and someone would be employed by this. Seriously, I don't get it.
(That's not the snark, but it really does make you realize how stupid that reporter is. If you don't believe that a stimulus was necessary, well, you're an idiot, but, regardless, once you do have a stimulus, what's wrong with using it…
mikethemadbiologist | July 11, 2009
(from here)
The Honoré Daumier exhibit is at the Central Library and is phenomenal. The BPL also has a great online exhibit of old travel posters (the amount of stuff the BPL has is incredible--if only there were more funding to exhibit it all...).
Check them both out.
mikethemadbiologist | July 11, 2009I know I'm going to sound like a broken record, but, once again, a major part of the stimulus should have been to make up state budget shortfalls, which stemmed from the economic recession. Not only is it good economic policy (what's the point of the federal government putting people to work, only to have state governments fire other people), but those state budget cuts reduce services:
Franklin Park Zoo, a Boston institution that has drawn generations of city and suburban families, may be forced to close its doors and possibly euthanize some of its animals as a result of the deep budget…
mikethemadbiologist | February 18, 2009
This is not the Mad Biologist
Or how the Boston Phoenix proves they missed the point of Shepard Fairey's work (Fairey made the iconic Obama poster). I'll get to that in a moment, but Sunday, I went to the ICA in Boston to see the Shepard Fairey exhibit. For me, it was a blast from the past: I was in Providence when the whole Andre the Giant thing started (I still have a sticker from that time). It was also funny to watch (discretely) a middle-aged--to be generous--docent explain to similarly aged visitors about Andre having a posse. Ironic proto-skaterpunk anarchism wasn't really…
mikethemadbiologist | February 9, 2009These Twitter feeds, captured by Atrios and written by 'moderate' Democrat Claire McCaskill, make it so perfectly clear that many elected officials have no idea how things are funded:
"Proud we cut over 100 billion out of recov bill.Many Ds don't like it, but needed to be done.The silly stuff Rs keep talking about is OUT."
And then:
"Going to Museum of Am History today.Haven't been since it re-opened.Want to check it out.Also grocery store and later a movie date with Joe."
As Atrios notes:
Hopefully she enjoys the museum. Amusingly, she also voted for the Coburn amendment which forbids the…
mikethemadbiologist | October 28, 2008One of the things that has puzzled me about natural history/science museums are the mineralogy exhibits. They really don't seem to be about anything other than "OOH! SHINY PEBBLE!" Mind you, they often have some very cool and shiny pebbles, but contrast them to paleontology exhibits.
Sure, museums try to get a big, scary looking dinosaur posed in some sort of fierce type of way. But somewhere in the exhibit you can usually learn something about evolution, ecology, or biomechanics. But I never see that with mineralogy exhibits. For once, I would like to see an exhibit that tells me what…
mikethemadbiologist | October 18, 2008The Boston Public Library has a really interesting exhibit of George Bellows' drawings. Here's one drawing, "The Law Is Too Slow":
Powerful stuff. Some additional pictures are here.
mikethemadbiologist | October 15, 2008Atrios describes one of the hidden, but very important costs of parking, especially in cities--parking:
I think self-driving cars are going to be here some time after flying cars, my jetpack, and Glenn Reynolds' sexbots, but this little thought experiment is useful for highlighting that while we talk about highways and roads and whatnot, the biggest problem with cars generally is parking. They take up space. Lots of it. That space reduces density most places, and reduces the benefits of density in places where it exists.
A hidden gem in the Boston area is the MIT Museum (kinda like…
mikethemadbiologist | September 18, 2008The NY Times has a good article about G. Wayne Clough, the new chancellor of the Smithsonian. Clough is definitely a breath of fresh air after former chancellor Lawrence Small who never met an extravagance he wouldn't make the Smithsonian pay for. First, Clough is setting an example of good conduct:
The Smithsonian's museum directors must now have their travel approved by an undersecretary of the institution, Dr. Clough said. Every new executive must undergo a thorough background check, and ethics is a regular topic of discussion among the Smithsonian's management.
Dr. Clough's own travel…
mikethemadbiologist | August 2, 2008While corn, and particularly corn derivatives such as corn syrup and ethanol additives, is seen as the devil, an excellent exhibit of posters at the Boston Public Library portrays a time when corn products were seen as a really good thing:
(from here)
The exhibit is open 9-9 Monday through Friday, and 9-5, Saturday (and it's free!).
mikethemadbiologist | February 18, 2008Lest the humanities feel neglected, the Republican War on Art keeps chugging along. In Bush's 2009 budget, the arts take massive hits across the board, with the sole exception of much needed maintenance funding of the Smithsonian. But first, by way of the Boston Phoenix, let's look at the most unconscionable part of the budget:
...nothing exemplifies the right wing's embrace of public ignorance more than its opposition to funding arts education in the schools. This position is beyond primitive. Even cave dwellers probably delighted in the animal figures they painted on their walls; not Bush…
mikethemadbiologist | January 12, 2008Whether or not you like maps, if you're in Boston, you should see this exhibit.
The Boston Public Library's Norman B. Leventhal Map Center has an incredible exhibit of New England maps, "Boston and Beyond: A Bird's Eye View of New England." All of the maps are realistic in that every street and building is actually drawn for a bunch of New England towns (the exhibit focuses on Boston, but most major New England cities are covered). It's remarkable to see the pre-'fill-in' maps of Boston: I figure I live what was once about 200 yards offshore.
It's a nice weekend (for Boston in January).…