What we're talking about 
Friday, November 2, 2012
Sandy Said and Done
Frankenstorm predicted
Class M October 30, 2012
OK, no one can predict a specific weather event months in advance. But what we can do is anticipate expected frequency of events. Back in February of this year, Nature Climate Change published a paper, Physically based assessment of hurricane surge threat under climate change, (PDF bypasses Nature’s paywall) that predicted more frequent storm surges…
Here’s Mitt Romney, from one of the Republican primary debates (moderated by John King of CNN): KING: You’ve been a chief executive of a state. I was just in Joplin, Missouri. I’ve been in Mississippi and Louisiana and Tennessee and other communities dealing with whether it’s the tornadoes, the flooding, and worse. FEMA is about…
If you are in the path…the thousand mile wide path…of Hurricane Sandy, a.k.a. Frankenstorm, then you should make sure you know what the storm could do in relationship to where you are. If you are in or near an area with mountains, look for very serious flash flooding. The winds will be strong everywhere. If…
Channel Surfing
Life Science
The Carnival of Evolution is up and running HERE at Sorting out Science. Catch up with the latest and greatest from the blogosphere on Evolution!
The Reports of the National Center for Science Education has just posted a new review of my book Among the Creationists. The reviewer is Taner Edis, professor of physics at Truman State University in Kirksville, Missouri. Since Edis’s own books on science and religion, The Ghost in the Machine and Science and Nonbelief are among…
Not only do bees sting, but they also bite victims that are too small for stingers (ex: wax moth larva that invade the beehive and eat pollen) and paralyze them for up to nine minutes by secreting 2-heptanone into the wound. This paralysis gives the bees time to remove the invaders from the beehive. Dr. Papachristoforou…
Physical Science
New faculty positions in multiple science and engineering disciplines, including astronomy, emphasizing computational analysis and data mining. Penn State is embarking on a transformative cluster hiring initiative in cyberscience – computation- and data-enabled science and engineering – to lead through cyber-enabled innovation in interdisciplinary research. This cross-college endeavor will coordinate multiple faculty appointments to develop…
The Drake Equation is that famous equation where you count how many stars there are, figure out the chance of a star having planets, of planets having water, etc. etc. until finally you get some rough estimate of the chance of live evolving elsewhere in the universe. It’s a little more complicated (and also simpler)…
“A cosmic mystery of immense proportions, once seemingly on the verge of solution, has deepened and left astronomers and astrophysicists more baffled than ever. The crux … is that the vast majority of the mass of the universe seems to be missing.” -William J. Broad Despite the wondrous, luminous sights of the night sky, we’ve…
Environment
The Bottleneck Years by H.E. Taylor Chapter 11 Table of Contents Chapter 13 Chapter 12 The Reception, July 23, 2055 Mom and Dad’s old friends, university people, and a gaggle of 32nd cousins chattered and whispered at tables throughout the reception hall. Matt and Jon had disappeared. I was doing my best to represent the…
Or so says Bloomberg (h/t Tamino and TP). And they should know? Well, maybe not; I’ll wait for something more definitive, perhaps from RC. But maybe indicative of how opinion is shifting, at least this week. As I’ve said before (but can’t find now) people – the great unwashed masses I mean – are unlikely…
I was in Boston this weekend visiting my sister, so didn’t have a chance to reprise my Irene prep post or any of the other approximately two billion (ok, maybe a slight exaggeration) posts I’ve made over the years about how to prepare for a natural disaster, but I’m still getting emails from people in…
Humanities
Suffocating to death in grain silos is an alarmingly common way for farmworkers to die. Prevention is simple, so why do these deaths continue?
The Reports of the National Center for Science Education has just posted a new review of my book Among the Creationists. The reviewer is Taner Edis, professor of physics at Truman State University in Kirksville, Missouri. Since Edis’s own books on science and religion, The Ghost in the Machine and Science and Nonbelief are among…
The McGregor Museum is a complex building with several wings surrounding an inner court yard, a multi-layered roof, balconies everywhere, and numerous trees in the court yard close in to the building. So, a cat can spend the heat of the day in the shaded crown of a tree, and the cool of the evening…
Education
USA Science and Engineering Festival: The Blog
Role Models in Science & Engineering Achievement: Gregorio Zara
Gregorio Zara — Filipino physicist and aeronautical engineer Creator of the first videophone ( a forerunner of such video telecommunication applications as Skype, Webcam and videoconferencing) and discoverer of the physical law known as the “Zara Effect.” PLEASE SHARE IF YOU ARE INSPIRED BY THIS STORY! Back in the 1950′s, the videophone — a telephone…
Not only do bees sting, but they also bite victims that are too small for stingers (ex: wax moth larva that invade the beehive and eat pollen) and paralyze them for up to nine minutes by secreting 2-heptanone into the wound. This paralysis gives the bees time to remove the invaders from the beehive. Dr. Papachristoforou…
USA Science and Engineering Festival: The Blog
Role Models in Science & Engineering Achievement: Carlos Juan Finlay
Carlos Juan Finlay — Cuban physician He was the first to theorize that the deadly yellow fever virus was transmitted through the bite of one species of mosquito, however it would take years before his theory would be deemed correct. We know today that yellow fever — which is most common in Latin America and…
Politics
The Bottleneck Years by H.E. Taylor Chapter 11 Table of Contents Chapter 13 Chapter 12 The Reception, July 23, 2055 Mom and Dad’s old friends, university people, and a gaggle of 32nd cousins chattered and whispered at tables throughout the reception hall. Matt and Jon had disappeared. I was doing my best to represent the…
I’ll vote for Brian and I think he’s make a great Congress person, but I will be speaking to him about dissing the stone age! If you want to help get rid of a Michele Bachmann clone, click here! And this too:
It’s a new month!
Medicine
I’d like to publicly thank Dr. John Killen, Jr. I was looking for something to write about yesterday evening, and, just when I was beginning to despair that I might have to do another post on the lunacy that is antivaccine nonsense (even I get tired of taking on antivaccine idiocy, as regular readers know),…
I guess this is in effect part two of yesterday’s post. Regular daily readers (and you are a regular daily reader, aren’t you?) will remember that yesterday I commented on the recent uptick in anti-Gardasil vaccine rhetoric coming from the antivaccine crank blog Age of Autism and other sources, in the process deconstructing speculation masquerading…
Not only do bees sting, but they also bite victims that are too small for stingers (ex: wax moth larva that invade the beehive and eat pollen) and paralyze them for up to nine minutes by secreting 2-heptanone into the wound. This paralysis gives the bees time to remove the invaders from the beehive. Dr. Papachristoforou…
Brain & Behavior
From Revkin I see yet another attempt to misunderstand the problem of communicating science vs anti-science. The author, Dan Kahan, summarizes his explanation for the science communication problem, as well as 4 other “not so good” explanations in this slide: He then describes “Identity-protective cognition” thus: Identity-protective cognition (a species of motivated reasoning) reflects the…
As you travel the inter-tubes in search of learned discourse, understanding and information to prepare you for the coming climate cataclysms, you will see many curious creatures, some common, some rare, who are here for the sole purpose of deterring, deceiving and confusing you. Some will pray on your admitted ignorance or uncertainty. Some will…
The Bottleneck Years by H.E. Taylor Chapter 9 Table of Contents Chapter 11 Chapter 10 Robert Fontaine, July 18, 2055 I was heading for the library when I got a phone call from Bessie Waters, a neighbour who visited with dad occasionally. She was worried. “I knocked on the door and there was no answer,”…
Technology
Not only do bees sting, but they also bite victims that are too small for stingers (ex: wax moth larva that invade the beehive and eat pollen) and paralyze them for up to nine minutes by secreting 2-heptanone into the wound. This paralysis gives the bees time to remove the invaders from the beehive. Dr. Papachristoforou…
The reality of weather modification is no conspiracy theory. Or at least, so say the conspiracy theorists…. Hurricane Sandy is being described as the “worst storm in 100 years” and will possibly mutate to super-storm status once it combines with a polar air mass over the eastern United States enabling it to cause widespread damage…
See Wind Map for real time animation. Also, do you notice anything over on the east coast?? (h/t to P3)
Information Science
Confessions of a Science Librarian
Friday Fun: UK Health Secretary to open world’s first placebo hospital
This is a classic case of “so funny because it’s so almost true that if you didn’t laugh you would stab yourself in the eye but that’s a bad idea because all the hospitals are placebo hospitals and placebos don’t work so well on stab wounds.” From my new best friend, Newsbiscuit: Jeremy Hunt to…
Confessions of a Science Librarian
Around the Web: On Naming Names and Calling Out Trolls, Not so tech-savvy millennials and more
On Naming Names and Calling Out Trolls Gawker, Reddit, Free Speech and Such Millennials: They Aren’t So Tech Savvy After All Project Information Literacy: Inventing the Workplace and How College Graduates Solve Information Problems Once They Join the Workplace The Philosophy of Open Access Impostors, Performers, Professionals – I and II (feeling like an academic…
Confessions of a Science Librarian
Getting Your Science Online: Presentation at Brock University Physics Department
It seems that Brock University in St. Catherine’s, Ontario really likes me. Two years ago, the Library kindly invited me to speak during their Open Access Week festivities. And this year the Physics Department has also very kindly invited me to be part of their Seminar Series, also to talk about Getting Your Science Online,…
Jobs
New faculty positions in multiple science and engineering disciplines, including astronomy, emphasizing computational analysis and data mining. Penn State is embarking on a transformative cluster hiring initiative in cyberscience – computation- and data-enabled science and engineering – to lead through cyber-enabled innovation in interdisciplinary research. This cross-college endeavor will coordinate multiple faculty appointments to develop…
At Palm Beach Groves in Lantana, Fla., a small, seasonal business that ships fresh citrus nationwide, employees have regularly voted between getting a raise or keeping their employer-based health insurance. Health coverage always wins, as many employees’ ages and pre-existing conditions would have made it nearly impossible to get coverage on their own. But a new report finds the Affordable Care Act is on target to help prevent this scenario.
Postdoctoral Scholar, Stellar and Exoplanetary Astrophysics and SETI “Applications are invited for a postdoctoral research associate position to work with Prof. Jason Wright and collaborators. The ideal applicant will have some combination of: • experience working with large photometric datasets, especially in the near and mid-IR • strong coding skills, in languages including IDL •…
