Politics
catdynamics | May 24, 2013Over the next 10 years, what research done on bodies within our Solar System (measurements and theory) will be most important for informing our search for life beyond the Earth?
This is the current topic posed as the Single Question on the Future of Astrobiology at the ongoing NASA Astrobiology Institute Roadmap online exercise.
If you want to opine, The Forum is Open
oracknows | May 22, 2013Chalk one up for the forces of anti-science, quackery, and pseudoscience. The citizens of Portland, Oregon just handed them a huge victory the other day when they once again rejected water fluoridation in a referendum:
Fluoride supporters, it appeared, had everything going for them.
Five Portland city commissioners had voted to add fluoride to the city water supply. Health advocacy groups, and many of the city's communities of color, lined up behind the cause. And proponents outraised opponents 3-to-1.
But none of that was enough. For the fourth time since 1956, Portlanders on Tuesday night…
kbonham | May 21, 2013Two weeks ago, the Heritage Foundation (a conservative think-tank) released a position paper based largely on the academic research of one Jason Richwine. The conclusion (roughly paraphrased): Hispanic people have lower IQ's than white people, so an overly permissive immigration policy will drag down the US economy.
Ethically, this conclusion is a deep affront to my liberal* sensibilities. The idea of basing our public policy on racism and bigotry is abhorrent.
Politically, this is dangerous territory. This is especially true after the 2012 election, when republican politicians were making…
catdynamics | May 20, 2013The final session in the online discussion of the NASA Astrobiology Roadmap is today from 4-5 pm eastern.
Go to Astrobiology Future to sign in to the live web chat. Questions and comments will be taken both from call-ins and from written questions.
The online discussion will be moderated by Dr Francis McCubbin from UNM, Dr Sean Raymond from Laboratoire d'Astrophysique de Bordeaux, and yours truly...
The live session will, as with the other Roadmap sessions, be followed by a week long opportunity to input questions, ideas and topics for discussion at The Astrobiology Future Forum.
The four…
catdynamics | May 20, 2013Astrobiology Future
The NASA online discussion session on the Astrobiology Roadmap continues this week.
This morning there was a web chat on "Early Evolution of Life and the Biosphere", which is being followed up by an ongoing online discussion on the questions posed and soliciting ideas for priorities in research direction.
The questions being discussed are:
How has the exponential growth in our discovery and understanding of exoplanets impacted the kinds of questions and information we extract from the early Earth record?
Are there problems you think are vital to understanding the early…
jdupuis | May 20, 2013This is a brief chronology of the current Conservative Canadian government's long campaign to undermine evidence-based scientific, environmental and technical decision-making. It is a government that is beholden to big business, particularly big oil, and that makes every attempt to shape public policy to that end. It is a government that fundamentally doesn't believe in science. It is a government that is more interested in keeping its corporate masters happy than in protecting the environment.
As is occasionally my habit, I have pulled together a chronology of sorts. It is a chronology of…
stoat | May 16, 2013 I got wound up by this whilst reading news on my phone while sitting in a boring meeting. So I'll vent here.
The usual scheme of things that we see so often is that bad things happen (the Assad regime in Syria); it goes on and on and people wring their hands, or ignore it, and anyway whilst bad the people are useful anti-commies or somesuch; and then it gets bad enough that the locals start revolting. At this point, its very much a "which way are you going to jump" issue for everyone in the country. Do they throw in their lot with a pile of untested rebels? Or do they sit on the fence…
catdynamics | May 15, 2013I come to praise Kepler, not to bury it...
Kepler!
The Kepler Mission is one of the little NASA spacecraft that so frequently comes along, exceeds all expectations and changes our perspective of the universe.
There is a good Quick History of the transit method and Kepler Mission concept on the website.
Otto Struve noted in his seminal 1952 note that planetary "eclipses" of their parent stars ought to be detectable by photoelectric methods, a proposal that some two decades later was quantified by Rosenblatt, and then explored in detail (including development research) by Borucki and…
catdynamics | May 10, 2013The future of Astrobiology research within NASA is being set now.
Next week there are further opportunities for community input.
The online discussion for Solar System Exploration wraps up today!
If you are an active researcher, a student planning on getting into astrobiology, or an interested member of the community, this is your chance to provide input on the direction of research.
This is your future.
Be there, or we will choose for you.
The NASA Astrobiology Roadmap exercise is under way, and will continue over the next two weeks.
NASA Astrobiology
The next two topics will kick off…
catdynamics | May 9, 2013What are Origami Nanosat Telescopes? How about Kinetic Inductance Detectors?
More importantly, what should we do with them?
NASA's Astrophysics is doing a Roadmap exercise, with the stated intent to look at science goals, technology and capabilities up to 30 years out!
White papers were solicited a few weeks ago, and about 100 were received and are archived online, about 3/4 on science and 1/4 on technology.
There was originally supposed to be a workshop for presentation of selected white papers, but in the world of sequestration that was not feasible, so instead there was a two day online…
catdynamics | May 8, 2013It is critically important that the community participate in the current ongoing discussion for the NASA roadmaps. Particularly if you are an early career researcher. This is your opportunity to make the case for what you think is interesting and important.
NASA Astrobiology
NASA is going through a series of Roadmap exercises by the different directorates, trying to set medium and long term policy for science goals, technology development and capabilities.
The NASA Astrobiology Program is doing a rolling series of Roadmap input sessions for four themes for Astrobiology.
Each theme kicks…
jdupuis | May 7, 2013Now there's a quote for you! Provocative in it's shortsightedness and fairly ignorant of how the interplay between scientific discovery and commercialization/technology transfer works. Commercial products are engineered and developed out of basic scientific discoveries.
So who said that?
Sadly, it was the John McDougall, President of the National Research Council of Canada talking about the restructuring and refocusing of the NRC.
Here's some more from the Sun News article:
The government of Canada believes there is a place for curiosity-driven, fundamental scientific research, but the…
oracknows | May 6, 2013Stem cells are magical, mystical things that can't be explained.
At least, if you listen to what docs and "practitioners" who run stem cell clinics in various parts of the world, usually where regulation is lax and money from First World clientele is much sought after, that's what you could easily come to believe. Unfortunately, it's not just Third World countries in which "stem cell clinics" have proliferated. For instance, they are not nearly uncommon enough in Europe. The example that is most troubling right now is Italy, and the reason is that there is currently a law being considered…
oracknows | May 2, 2013In the United States, the federal government has long had a prominent role in funding science research. Be it the $30 billion a year or so that funds the National Institutes of Health or the $5 or $6 billion a year allotted to the National Science Foundation, the government funds a lot of basic and applied research, and this is in general a good thing. The number of discoveries and advances that have come out of this funding have well repaid the investment and much more. There is, however, a downside to this funding that's a pretty obvious consequence any time the government funds anything,…
gregladen | April 27, 2013I was chatting live on Vonvo.com, speaking about the Boston Marathon Bombing with a few others. Vonvo is a new social media talkie thingie, a little like if Blogging Heads and Google Hangouts had a baby which then married Twitter.
A bit later I'll have links to the discussion.
jtoney | April 23, 2013It was an unexpected journey, from the George W. Bush Shake, the Barack Obama Hug to the Harlem Shake.
Appreciation from the President of the United States is one of the highest honors any American can receive. No, it wasn't me, but the best part is that it was one of our students.
I have been very fortunate in my own education having learned from two mentors awarded the National Medal of Science (Prof. Tobin J. Marks and Prof. Stephen J. Lippard.) Each received a hearty handshake from President George W. Bush. Perhaps some of my work in their labs helped get them there, along with a…
illconsidered | April 22, 2013(these are of course NA dates)
Event Title: Do the Math ... If you Love this Planet// Earth Night Gathering
Venue: Country Park {Mobile Home} Community Clubhouse
Location: Clearwater, FL
Start Time: Sunday, April 21, 7:00 PM
You can RSVP here: http://act.350.org/event/do_the_math_movie_attend/4678/signup/?t=2&akid=3034.683317.zTETWN
Event Title: "Do the Math" sustainability tour movie at Eckerd College.
Venue: Eckerd College Campus at Fox Hall
Location: St Petersburg, FL, FL
Start Time: Sunday, April 21, 7:00 PM
You can RSVP here: http://act.350.org/event/do_the_math_movie_attend/…
gregladen | April 16, 2013We watch these events unfold through a veil of tears. And over time, it only gets worse as we learn the identities of some of the victims, and learn of the horrors of this particular kind of bomb attack. We wonder if the bomber knew that few would die but many would lose their legs, or if families of living vibrant people, standing together to watch other family members finish their run for some worthy cause, would be turned into a collection of news stories about the dead and the maimed. We also wonder why this target was chosen. Timothy McVeigh attacked a Federal office building to…
drorzel | April 15, 2013I was re-reading bits of James Gleick's Feynman biography, and ran across a bit near the end (page 397 of my hardcover from 1992) talking about his relationship with his children, talking about how ordinary he seemed at home.I particularly liked the sentence "Belatedly it dawned on them that not all their friends could look up their fathers in the encyclopedia." It occurred to me that that would be a good line for an obituary.
This is not due to any particularly morbid cast of mind on my part, but lingering blowback from the kerfuffle over the New York Times obituary for Yvonne Brill a couple…
illconsidered | April 15, 2013Via Planet3.0 I see there is a declaration of the need, and competitive advantage it would bring, for action on climate change signed by a not insignificant number of major (non-fossil fuel) corporations. As Michael Tobis points out, it is, rather strangely, presented as an image only.
So my contribution is running it through an OCR tool, formatting and presenting it below:
Tackling climate change is one of America's greatest economic opportunities of the 21st century
(and it's simply the right thing to do)
What made America great was taking a stand. Doing the things that are hard. And…