Passing thoughts
jstemwedel | May 14, 2006Because (primary) election season is almost upon us, one's mind sometimes turns to thoughts of coalition building. And sometimes, you can find allies in places you wouldn't normally think to look.
For example ...
I totally wouldn't think of Skeletor as my kind of politician. But, Skeletor's day job is being He-Man's mortal enemy. He's a natural enemy of the patriarchy!
(You know Skeletor hates the patriarchy. The patriarchy imposes outrageous standards to which no one can live up easily. Case in point: Skeletor's ripped abs. Dude's a skeleton and he feels the need to have ripped abs.…
jstemwedel | May 4, 2006OK, if you clicked through the links in my answers to the ABC meme, you know an embarrassing personal detail about me: I rather enjoy watching America's Next Top Model. (Truth be told, I wouldn't enjoy it nearly so much were it not enhanced by the reading of snarky episode recaps by Potes. And, as it turns out, regular commenter Uncle Fishy knows Potes from when he lived in Providence -- so I had to read the recaps.)
If you don't like wallowing in the depravity of others (which is to say, my depravity), feel free to go read a classic post from the vault. Otherwise, read on.
So, Top Model…
jstemwedel | May 4, 2006Please notice that the title of this post promises a "paranoid response", not a careful analysis. It's one of those unscheduled features of this blog. Kind of like a snow day.
Yesterday's Inside Higher Ed has an article about the U.S. Senate getting kind of testy with the director of the NSF about certain research projects the NSF has seen fit to fund. Regular readers know that I think we can have a reasoned debate about funding priorities (especially when that funding is put up by the public). It does not sound to me like the exchange in the Senate was that kind of reasoned debate.
From…
jstemwedel | May 2, 2006Hey, it's May already! Could that explain why things are crazy-busy here?
There will be new content soon, once I've plowed through some more grading and exam-writing and curricular trouble-shooting. In the meantime, since I copped to enjoying reality TV more than I should (in that ABC meme, under "Not going to cop to"), I thought I'd share a May post from the earlier incarnation of this blog, a post in which I muse on what "The Apprentice" (a show, as of this season, I no longer watch ... we've grown apart) might teach us about how to improve the scientific community.
Yes, it's utterly daft…
jstemwedel | April 29, 2006Via GrrlScientist, the precisely calibrated quiz for determining theme songs yields the following for me:
Your Theme Song is Back in Black by AC/DC
"Back in black, I hit the sack,
I've been too long, I'm glad to be back"
Things sometimes get really crazy for you, and sometimes you have to get away from all the chaos.
But each time you stage your comeback, it's even better than the last!
What's Your Theme Song?
I am amused.
jstemwedel | April 27, 2006The grading is unrelenting. The crud is not entirely cleared from my system. I still owe you the promised post on plagiarism.
Must be time for a meme (specifically, the ABC meme, which I saw at jo(e)'s)!
Accent: Not usually. When I taught lots of kids from Maryland and Virginia, I'd drift a little southern. Out here, I sometimes drift a little surfer (dude!). But, despite having spent the bulk of my childhood in New Jersey, I don't have a Joisey accent.
Booze: Usually single-malt Scotch, but this time of year mojitos.
Chore I Hate: Besides grading? Dishes. Thankfully, my better half…
jstemwedel | April 27, 2006Although certain bloggers of my acquaintance are suspicious of Emily Dickinson, I think she's the bee's knees. It wouldn't be National Poetry Month without a selection from Emily.
In case you're hesitating about clicking "Read on", I will entertain, in the comments, a discussion of whether the position Miss Dickinson advocates in the poem is an ethical one. And, a bonus fun fact: nearly every Emily Dickinson poem can be sung to the tune of "The Yellow Rose of Texas".
Tell all the Truth but tell it slant --
Success in Circuit lies
Too bright for our infirm Delight
The Truth's superb surprise…
jstemwedel | April 26, 2006Chemists can be quite a literary bunch. Consider Primo Levi. Carl Djerassi. And, of course, Nobel Prize - winning chemist Roald Hoffman. Below the fold, Hoffman's poem "An unusual state of matter":
In the beach sands of Kerala,
abraded from the gneiss, in the stream sands of North Carolina
one finds monazite, the solitary
mineral. In its crystalline beginning
there was order, there was a lattice.
And the atoms - cerium, lanthanum,
thorium, yttrium, phosphate - danced
round their predestined sites,
tethered by the massless springs
of electrostatics
and by their neighbors' bulk.
They…
jstemwedel | April 25, 2006Poetry by Marianne Moore
I, too, dislike it: there are things that are important beyond all this
fiddle.
Reading it, however, with a perfect contempt for it, one discovers
in
it after all, a place for the genuine.
Hands that can grasp, eyes
that can dilate, hair that can rise
if it must, these things are important not because a
high-sounding interpretation can be put upon them but because they
are
useful. When they become so derivative as to become
unintelligible,
the same thing may be said for all of us, that we
do…
jstemwedel | April 24, 2006Seen at Afarensis and Evolgen. Yeah, it's another internet quiz, but it's science-y and the graphics are really cool.
The Vacuole You scored 43 Industriousness, 19 Centrality, and 26 Causticity!
You're the Vacuole!
Found mostly in plant cells, this is a most important organelle. You do a whole bunch of stuff:
- Capture of food
- Maintenance of internal water pressure
- Containment of waste products
- Maintenance of an acidic internal pH
- Storage of defense molecules (toxins) and
- Enable a cell to elongate rapidly
In terms of real life, you're probably the jack-of-all trades. You…
jstemwedel | April 23, 2006I saw it at Julie's. Below the fold is a list of 101 movies that the movie-intelligensia think you should have seen in order to have an intelligent discussion about film.
I have bolded the movies I have seen. As well (though I'm adding this part), I'm italicizing movies I have officially "seen" but know that I fell asleep in the middle of seeing them. (Most of these are post-sprog rentals.) And (one last modification), I'm putting an asterisk next to the ones that arguably have something like scientific content (even if peripheral).
Feel free to tell me, in the comments, which of the ones…
jstemwedel | April 17, 2006If this quiz is good enough for Tara, who am I to resist it? Especially since my eyes are no longer gummed shut.
The results from the culture below the fold.
What Disease Are You?
You Are Influenza!Also known as the flu, you are warm, nurturing, and make a great confidante. People admire you for your gentleness and honesty. While you can't literally wipe out 35,000,000 people by causing them to drown in their own phlegm, you sure can clear out a room with your lame jokes.Take this quiz!
Quizilla |
Join
| Make A Quiz | More Quizzes | Grab Code
jstemwedel | April 8, 2006Finally we had a weekend day (and evening) with no rain. So, my better half got me a new bag of mesquite charcoal, I took the wire brush to the Weber, and I officially greeted Spring by grilling our dinner.
Of course, while you're tending the grill, your mind sometimes wanders, and you end up pondering (possibly geeky) questions. Such as:
Does grilling vegetables (or tofu) create the same kind of carcinogenic compounds that are created by grilling meat?
If so, given that eating lots of vegetables is supposed to reduce one's cancer risk, is it a wash?
Or, is there an optimal volume-to-…
jstemwedel | April 5, 2006I'm a total sheep. Cool kids like Chris Clarke are making subversive Chevy Tahoe commercials, and I just couldn't help myself.
I made one too.
Please, before you rant up my comments, I fully believe that you are a responsible SUV driver. It's the irresponsible ones I encounter on my commute that make me angry ...
jstemwedel | April 1, 2006Oh wait, it looks like I don't ...
GrrlScientist, the resident online quiz maven, points us to the online tool EgoSurf. Said tool does a "deep search" with the search word you provide, looking for links to the domain you indicate (like, for example, your weblog).
So, I went egosurfing with this site, using both my nom de blog and my real name as the search terms. As you'll see from the results (below the fold), I might have an easier time letting go of my ego than some of my sibling bloggers because ... well, there's less to let go of.
3032 ego points (as Dr. Free-Ride)
3870 ego points (as…
jstemwedel | April 1, 2006On April 1, internet quizzes seem at least as appropriate as renouncing our principled stands on the world, so here we go again. GrrlScientist poses the first part of the question: are you an idiot?
But she doesn't deal with the obvious follow-up question: what are you going to do with that intelligence?
My answers (as measured by quizzes that actually claim not to be "scientific measurements of what kind of person you are") below the fold.
I am 9% Idiot.
I am not annoying at all. In fact most people come to me for advice. Of course they annoy the hell out of me. But what can I do? I am…
jstemwedel | March 28, 2006Yes, another real post is coming soon, but the cool kids are abuzz about a new internet quiz, so ...
You Are 32% Evil
A bit of evil lurks in your heart, but you hide it well.
In some ways, you are the most dangerous kind of evil.
How Evil Are You?
It is worth noting that I did not check the box next to corrupting a minor. I only teach philosophy to those who can render proper consent.
A bit less evil than I expected, but perhaps on the high side for someone who "does ethics" and doesn't eat meat.
(Yes, I know Hitler was a vegetarian. Move along.)
jstemwedel | March 26, 2006Because GrrlScientist asks, I took the quiz about whether my blog is working for me or I am working for my blog:
31.25 %
My weblog owns 31.25 % of me.Does your weblog own you?
Thank my students, my colleagues, and my family for providing me with conditions where the real world keeps my virtual world from becoming all-consuming.
jstemwedel | March 25, 2006My university had events on campus today for newly admitted students. My department tapped me (and two of our fabulous philosophy students) to man the Philosophy Department table at the College of Humanities and Arts open house.
Hundreds of admitted students -- many with their parents -- milling around in a room with such enticing major departments as English & Comparative Literature, Art & Design, Music & Dance (yes, the cool ones have ampersands), and we were supposed to sell Philosophy.
We opted for brazenness, and wrote in big letters on the white-board/easel we had brought…
jstemwedel | March 22, 2006Do other bloggers ever stalk you in real life?
OK, maybe it doesn't count if (1) it's someone you know from real life (and I think even an online course counts as real life here), and (2) it's someone who actually has business to transact in the building in which you run into her. Besides, Julie's a pretty cool blogger by whom to be stalked.
Anyway, Julie was kind enough to chat with me as I walked to class, and something like the following exchange took place:
J.M.: So how's that ethics in science class of yours going.
Dr. F-R: Love! The students are really sharp and they seem really…