Random Thoughts

I won't bore you with an introduction but I'll just say "Ghostbusters" is one of the funniest movies of all time. So I decided to live blog it, but just the science parts. Let me know how I did. Opening: Great movies open with something happening. A rare few, like "Superman", can start with credits. Librarians getting the bejeezus scared out of them are always funny. In 2 minutes, we already feel like something happened, then we get a teaser of the song. 02 minutes: Was Dr. Venkman being overly cautious in his assessment of the female test subject in "Ghostbusters"? I remember watching…

With 365 days in a year and a whole lot of causes and events and gimmicks, it is no surprise that there are sometimes lots and lots of 'National XYZ' Days on the same day. The National Months get kind of cluttered too. October is Adopt a Shelter Dog Month, American Pharmacist Month, Apple Jack Month, Awareness Month, Breast Cancer Awareness Month, Clergy Appreciation Month, Computer Learning Month, Cookie Month, Domestic Violence Awareness Month, Eat Country Ham Month. International Drum Month, Lupus Awareness Month, National Diabetes Month, National Pizza Month, National Vegetarian…

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Since I retired three years ago, I have been becoming almost as sessile as a sea squirt, sitting in front of my computer, reading not just news but comment and what people are thinking about things.  Among the ‘things’, women’s equality is very much to the front these days. Reading not just comment articles, but the comments to these, one gets the impression that a section of the population, making capital out of their own ignorance, are digging themselves ever deeper into the belief that oppression of women started among the Hebrews.  A modicum of knowledge of the civilizations of…

I'm selling two of my guitars and an anecdote about one of them typifies the difference between a sane hippie and the anti-science kind. In 2002 I bought a 1968 D-35 12 string guitar (D-12-35 is their odd nomenclature).  In 1970 basically all Brazilian rosewood was banned so this one has the distinction of being pre-ban Rosewood. Shortly after I bought it, I had some recurring problems with my Internet cable and I had this really wonderful tech who came out a few times to try and solve it. He was an older guy, gray ponytail, knew his stuff; we got along swimmingly but the problem was…

I don't know enough math to know if this has been precisely defined but I know enough about my ignorance of math to know that if there is such a definition I probably won't understand it.  Mathematics fails to be a universal language in most respects because mathematicians can rarely articulate their concepts in layman's language that actually makes sense.  A universal language is only universal iff the common folk can grok it too. I have waited nigh on 50 years to say that publicly.  But that's not what I want to say with respect to my rambling about the definition.  My…

I think a lot about science outreach. As a non-scientist, I am simultaneously the exact person science outreach advocates say should be excited about science while a few believe my interest (along with 80% of you) in science should consist solely of paying taxes that can then go to government grants, to pay for science they can insist they are doing for us. I've been thinking about it more since Science Ghetto: Missives From The Low-Prestige, Low-Value Part Of News, where longtime USA Today science journalist Dan Vergano worried that science writers were creating "a secret garden walled off,…

Applying the laws of men to murky facts is almost as hard as determining the laws of nature.   In science we have clear experimental and observational data and tease out the laws of science.   In the law the facts are in question the laws are known.  It was hard to decide but the guy clearly chopped up his wife, just kidding.  The case wasn't nearly that interesting.That is what I would tell people who asked me about the case when I as gagged by the court.  In truth the case was a personal injury, slip and fall case. Without giving names or details that would pick…

Omics slapped at the end of words is the latest rage. It makes just about anything sound scientific. If someone says they read an astrology journal, for example, I might roll my eyes a little, but if they call their journal Astrolomics, well ... okay, I would still roll my eyes a little, but if they say they are attending a Beeronomics conference, they are making their way into my blog. And clever folks at the University of York have done just that. Beeronomics 2013, held next month, is an event where experts shall debate issues affecting the industry. And in Britain it's quite an industry.…

I haven't been on this site in a while, and in looking at a past article it strikes me that some of my previously posted views have changed. (Congratulations, right?) Normally, this is the kind of thing I'd tuck away in some cortical sulcus, but I think it's worth posting because it has got me thinking about some bigger questions. My post on commercial brain-computer interfaces from November of last year meandered around that peculiar industry for a bit and ultimately examined a study in which the authors discuss a proof-of-concept for pulling out volunteers' banking locations, ATM PINs…