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gregladen | July 21, 2011A Hadron is a kind of particle, made of quarks. There are two kinds of hadrons, baryons (made out of three quarks) and mesons (made out of a quark and a quirky quark known as an antiquark).
The particle of interest is made up of an up quark, a strange quark, and a heavy bottom quark. I've known a few bluegrass bands that fit that description, but this particle is called the Xi-sub-b baryon.
The observation was made at the Collider Detector at Fermilab (CDF) .
The neutral Xi-sub-b belongs to the family of bottom baryons, which are about six times heavier than the proton and neutron…
gregladen | July 21, 2011I have a new post up at 10,000 Birds: How much bird is there, anyway? Please have a look and leave a comment!
Also, as a reminder, there is still time to make your opinion known regarding the proposed Sandhill Crane hunt in Kentucky: Last Gasp for Sandhill Cranes--Act Now!. And if you want to know why I never shot any cranes you can find out here: The first crane and the last crane
hrynyshyn | July 21, 2011"Gobal warming is not about overconsumption, morality, ideology or capitalism. It is largely the result of human beings generating energy by burning hydrocarbons and coal."
-- Mark Lynas, in his book The God Species: How the Planet Can Survive the Age of Humans
Provocative? Bleedingly obvious? Guaranteed to generate some comment (and sell some books). Worth pondering. Which I will do before weighing in.
gregladen | July 20, 2011For now.
When it comes down to it, benevolent dictatorship resting on a perfectly anarchistic base is the only way to go. Democracy is too easily bought. Free Market Forces do not make everything all nice and efficient and stuff. Wherever information can be OpenSource and OpenAccess it should be; No institution should be allowed to exist for more than a few years; Somehow the infrastructure needs to be efficient, effective, and free (OpenInfrastructure) and then, everything else, we'll let Google take care of.
Or at least that's the plan for now. And when Google goes evil? Revolution…
stoat | July 20, 2011...I will wear the green willow. Yes, we went up: yay! Though that doesn't begin to capture it.
L to R: Andy Southgate (4); Steven Andrews (5); Chris Wood (2); Ollie Crabb (S); James Tidy (Cox); Chris Metcalfe (3); William Connolley (B); James Howard (7; with George); Chris Smith (6).
Yesterday, Tabs 3 caught City 3 round about Grassy; and since we mostly held station with Tabs, we were happy that we could get City in a fair fight. But! Behind us, Champs 2 had caught Nines 3 not much after the motorway bridge: and while we'd pulled away from Nines by at least 1/2 a length, that was still a…
gregladen | July 20, 2011Gregor Mendel is the Augustinian Monk and Scientist who developed the model of genetics that held sway all the way through the Darwinian Synthesis (when, essentially, it was introduced and integrated) and right up until recently, when it has weakened considerably compared to other conceptions of genetics based on observations not possible in his time. "Mendelian Genetics" still "works" more or less, it just applies to fewer cases in its original simple form. Mendel's main contribution was probably to demonstrate that inheritance involves both parents in roughly equal ways ant that the unit…
gregladen | July 20, 2011I've spoken about Uncanny Valley before. Here's a little write-up from Wired Science on some related brain research.
gregladen | July 20, 2011Scienceblogs Abbie Smith (ERV) will be the guest on this weeks Skeptically Speaking:
Skeptically Speaking #122 HIV and AIDS
This week, we're joined by graduate student and Scienceblogs writer Abbie Smith, to learn about the latest research on the Human Immunodeficiency Virus. How does HIV cause AIDS? What are the latest treatments? How close are we to a cure? What strategies are most effective at stopping the spread of infection ? And what are the arguments that denialists make for alternate causes of the disease? Tune in and find out!
We record live with Abbie Smith on Sunday, July 24 at 6…
gregladen | July 19, 2011Marc Hauser, whom I've discussed before a few times, has resigned from his position at Harvard. This was somewhat unexpected.
Marc Hauser, a well-known Harvard psychology professor who has been on leave since an internal investigation found him guilty of eight counts of scientific misconduct, is leaving the university.
"Marc Hauser has resigned his position as a faculty member, effective August 1, 2011," Harvard spokesman Jeff Neal wrote in an e-mail statement today.
Hauser was a popular professor known for his research and writing on the evolutionary underpinnings of morality and the…
gregladen | July 19, 2011I've only got random stuff for you now, but it is all good stuff. Well, not really all good, but it is most definitively all stuff.
First, we have Chris Mooney interviewing Rebecca Watson in a Point of Inquiry Podcast. Give it a listen.
I'm happy to be one of the men who supports Rebecca. Those of you who are mad at me for that please continue to comment here, because Imma write a book about WTF is going on in your heads. Along the lines of a Stephen King novel, I think.
On a more mundane and immediate note, we just received word of a four year old girl drowned in Clearwater Park.…
krandall | July 19, 2011By Dr. Cynthia Phillips
Planetary geologist at the Carl Sagan Center for the Study of Life in the Universe, SETI Institute
The final mission of Space Shuttle Atlantis has spawned a whole series of perspective pieces on the history, state, and future of space exploration. Some, like the YouTube video "NASA's increase of awesome to continue," are unabashedly exuberant celebrations of the future in store for us in space; others, like this thoughtful piece in Technology Review entitled "Was the Space Shuttle a Mistake?," are depressingly and effectively critical of the cost both in dollars (more…
gregladen | July 18, 2011So, I push you.
Then, you push me.
Then, I push you.
Then, you push me.
Then, I push you.
Then, you push me.
And I go "Hey, no pushing! Unfair!!!!"
Or perhaps it goes like this, a little more complicated:
Rebecca says something
Stef says something
PZ says something
A buncha people say something
Richard says something
A buncha people say something
And at any point in there, depending on which thing was said by which person, you yell "Hey, stop all the argument, we're done now!!! This has gone on too long!"
It's like a New York subway. You get on the subway near the beginning, and that…
gregladen | July 18, 2011The first crane I ever saw is a bird burned permanently in my memory. It came out of nowhere and flew close by, staying in view lit by a nearly setting sun for about five wing beats. A gun was raised to shoot it but the trigger was not pulled.
I was a teenager, and the brother of a co-worker invited me to go hunting with him. The idea was not for me to actually hunt, but rather, for me to see what hunting was all about. It was a social gesture and a manly gesture. If I like hunting perhaps I would join one of their hunting groups, get a firearm, learn to shoot, and become one of the boys…
pharyngula | July 17, 2011Yesterday, I listened to the talks by Sadie Crabtree and Carol Tavris on the art of persuasion, and how we can further our cause by applying the science of psychology. Today, I sat on a panel with Sadie and Carol, and also Phil Plait and Eugenie Scott and Jamy Ian Swiss, discussing communicating skepticism. I didn't go in with any notes — it was a panel! — but I thought I'd try to articulate in text the points I tried to make. So some of this is stuff I said on the panel, and some it is stuff I just wish I'd said.
Sure, there is irrational, unbreakable core to the opposition, but there are…
gregladen | July 17, 2011This from Julie at 10,000 Birds:
Kentucky's Department of Fish and Wildlife Resources unanimously passed its sandhill crane hunting proposal. All eight hunters on the commission think it's a good idea to shoot cranes in Kentucky. The proposal now goes to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service for final approval or denial. The public comment period on the Kentucky sandhill crane hunting proposal ends AUGUST 1 2011.
Read the details here, including information on what you need to do to help stop this. Take action and spread the word. Julie's post has the address for submitting written comments…
jtoney | July 16, 2011
With heated discussion about raising the debt ceiling for the U.S., this is a good time for some perspective about America's top earners and for some ideas of how their enormous earnings could lead to public good. No, they can't solve our spending problem, tax system or get us out of debt, but they do have some options unavailable to the average citizen. Public indignation over huge bonuses for bankers is old news, but a recent report that the top 25 hedge fund managers averaged $1 billion per year is a bit much.
Even more striking is the top ten list, with David Tepper (Appaloosa…
pharyngula | July 16, 2011Then maybe you'll be interested in joining the Pharyngula horde at the Garden Buffet at 6pm (and later) for whatever. It's a Pharyngula meetup in the casino!
gregladen | July 16, 2011People on Google+ are discussing what to do with their circles. Here, I'm not going to explain what circles are; I wish merely to record for the moment what I'm doing with them on my account for others to consider and criticize. If you don't know what circles are, join Google+ and find out, and don't forget to put me in one of your circles! (Put me in a good one!)
I have the following circles at the moment:
Friends
Family
Acquaintances
Following
Anthropology
BlogComs
NewsOutlets
Linux
The first four are default for google+ though I think you can delete them. The remainder are ones I…