Random Thoughts
If you love skateboarding and if you love Venice, and if you are curious to see how a skater can live there regardless of the cronic absence of sporting structures (no skate parks, no way), have a look at this short video, which shows a few skate tricks performed in the streets of downtown Venice.
You might wonder what does this have to do with particle physics and with my blog. Little, admittedly. But the tricks are in part made by my son Filippo, 12 years old. This is his first video on YouTube and he's getting excited by few tens of hits.... So I thought I'd give him a boost by pasting the…
Folks went apeshit over Stephen Hawking speaking his belief that heaven is a fairy tale. Some crazy fool insisted the rapture was today. And the world turned on. And on it will turn.
Why did these two non-stories capture so much attention in a world where so many other things should have more weight? Why would anyone be surprised an atheist wouldn't believe in heaven and a true believer might go a bit overboard and think he could predict the second coming?
Even Christians giggled about the rapture bit. Probably not the same Christians who felt the need to go all apeshit over…
Hank |
The Cubs have gone longer than any team in baseball without winning a World Series. Before that, the Sed Sox were commonly regarded as the Sad Sack's of the game, even though the Cubs had historically been far worse. But the Red Sox lifted "The Curse of The Bambino" in 2004.
The 'curse', if you are unfamiliar, went like this: In 1918 the Red Sox won their fifth World Series, the most by any club and added proof of their dynasty. They won using the pitching (and hitting) of George Herman Ruth, commonly known now as Babe Ruth, The Babe, The Bambino, the Sultan of Swat,…
Hank |
"Did you know the Rapture is May 21st?" I asked Mrs. Science 2.0. "That's tomorrow. Are you prepared?"
"The season finale of Grey's Anatomy was last night, so I am okay, " she replied.
"What about date night tomorrow? If I make dinner reservations for 6:05 and the world ends at 6, do I still get credit for trying? Saving 8 bucks isn't worth it if you're mad at me."
"You love to triangulate. Work on that from a few angles and tell me what you think the right answer is."
She's right, I do love triangles. I can make anything a triangle. …
Hank |
The need for more science education is so ingrained in the science lexicon it has practically become a mantra. This makes sense; without question America leads the world in science output, producing over 31 percent of the studies with less than 6 percent of the world population(1), but in an increasingly competitive world, and with ever-growing populations in Asia, science education will remain important to anyone who wants to retain leadership.
But does that mean we need more science educators? Needing more sounds like we have a deficit. The data say otherwise and perhaps…
Hank |
First, a cultural fact: The NFL Draft can be seen for three solid days by every cable subscriber in America. This is hours and hours of nothing but 30 seconds of reading out a name punctuated by 14.5 minutes of nothing - actually, brief bursts of activity separated by committee meetings sounds a lot like most football games, but it consumed an entire network a short while ago even though the sport may not even be played this fall.
How is that relevant on a science site?
I'll get to that, but first you should know Meryl Streep is not going to play Marie Curie in a performance none of…
calliope |
Just a quick note today, on getting DIY stuff done. Schedules are better than plans. Just blocking out the time during which you will tackle a task is more important than figuring out how you're going to do it.
This applies to writing also. All the proposal work and outlining won't
get your book down. Being forced to sit down and type will get your
book done.
For a large project, you need to have a plan because you have multiple people involved. Even in an Agile setup, you need a project plan. "Agile" isn't an excuse for no planning or for laziness. …
An interesting bit that came my way, which I will let stand by itself:
So it is sometimes hard to browse
through a popular bookshop without encountering the kind of volume that takes
UFO’s, the Bermuda Triangle, the Egyptian pyramids, or whatever is of interest
to the author, and seeks to pull all the selected areas of ignorance together so
as to allow one grand theory that will account for everything. This may
be called a ‘conflation of ignorances’. In science, we do not properly
understand quantum events; nor do we understand much about human consciousness. …
I have trouble keeping my appointments. I didn't use to, but one day my parents told me to buy an agenda. They thought they were doing me a favour.
So I started writing down all my appointments in my agenda, which was great: I didn't have to remember them any more! Unfortunately, I had to remember to check whether I had any. So much for my appointments.
Luckily, cellphones came in. Now, that is handy stuff. Not only do they keep your appointments for you, they also remind you of them! And they do a bunch of other cool stuff too. For instance, they keep track of your friends' birthdays, which…
Hank |
The 1950s were a golden age in America economically - a huge chunk of the middle class had a car and a house and a good life with only one parent working; a pipe dream in today's economy, but income taxes were only on the rich and government was not promising to do everything and taxing people to do it.
But the 1950s were also a paradox; racism was still acceptable to many and so were other forms of discrimination, like against working women.
We all know that, but The New York Times, as usual, cannot see what it does not want to see about a time when America was good, and perhaps better…