It was orange. I wrote a review about it. I still can’t explain it... and I just can’t stop. But that’s what they call it: Good things should never end.
Maybe it’s because it’s nearly summer. Maybe it’s because I finally finished my finals. Maybe it’s all a result of coincidence and random web browsing. Whatever the reason, I feel like filling my blog with warm, happy colors this weekend. What better place to begin, than with a fractal? A Fractal Sunset(look below to see it "set") This is a combination of sets, each transformed to simulate ripples on a lake. One (the mountain range) is a Julia set, while the other (the sun) is the modified interior of a Mandelbrot set. Usually, when you see a Mandelbrot set or Julia set you see busy spirals…
Senator McCain thinks the effort to preserve our horticultural record and a potential treasure trove for medicinal science is a waste of money. This morning, I went to Senator McCain’s town hall meeting at the Jewish Community Center in Denver. The Rocky Mountain News made it sound as if I was part of some sneaky infiltration: "The mainstream media has basically given McCain a free ride so far by not asking him tough questions," wrote Michael Huttner, president of ProgressNow. "So it’s important for citizens to ask those questions ourselves." The group became concerned, however, when the…
So, here I am, with a huge backlog of things to post--science news and lab reports, fractal art, tips for green living--you know, the usual stuff. And, so, with all that ready to go, what do I do when I get my computer functioning? I write something else. I guess that’s not too unusual. Poetic inspiration comes when it does--the wise writer shouldn’t argue with it. Yet, it wasn’t the fluidity and ease of writing that surprised me--it was the topic. "I don’t write stories about the war," I said on Monday. Five days later, I’m going over the third draft of a story about war. It’s a subject I…
For some of my friends, today is a holiday. So, to celebrate, here’s a fractal: Fractal 420(Click the image for a desktop sized version, or here for an alternate version.) Note: If you’re wondering where I’ve been, or why this post is so brief, don’t worry. I’ve just been having some issues with my keyboard (it keeps typing the wrong things or jumping a "page up") which makes any writing a serious pain in the wrist. I’m going to try to clean my keyboard out with canned air later today, or, if all else fails, I’ll just buy a new one. Fractal created by the author using ChaosPro.
What if you could escape this busy world, rise above the clouds, and see everything from a new perspective? From that astronauts-eye-view, you could see the greenhouse effect in action: Sunlight pouring in, some reflected off of clouds in the upper layers of the atmosphere, some filtering down below. The light that does manage to reach the earth is absorbed or reflected by the surface below. That reflected earth shine bounces off the clouds as well, in colors imperceptible to you or I. Would it be an alien sight? Colors we can’t see, our homes obstructed by that foggy greenhouse roof, with…
Now, this is the way we ought to be testing our children: Questionaut: A Point-and-Click Quiz Adventure by Amanita Design and the BBC One of the most talented names in the casual gaming business, Amanita Design, creators of the delightful Samorost series, have just teamed up with the BBC to come up with this absolute gem of a game. It’s so cute, you won’t realize it is supposed to be educational... that is until you find yourself completely stumped on a math* question. The questions are aimed at 11-year-olds, but that may not keep you from scratching your head a few times. Even finding the…
Well, I’ve probably set a new record for myself--2 weeks without a post. As you might imagine, I’ve been a little busy lately. For some reason, midterms really snuck up on me and hit me hard this spring... suffering a head cold and an internet outage in the middle of it didn’t help much. Throw in the fact that I’m in the middle of redecorating my living room, and you’ll see that I’ve barely had time to sleep, let alone blog. Not that I’ve had much exciting news to blog about--the highlight of my last week was sorting through my massive book collection, trying to pare it down to the point…
It is rather fun to have a birthday on February 29th. Today is my 8th birthday, which is pretty weird, considering my young son will have his 8th birthday later in the year. For him, it’ll be the same old birthday. For me, it’s, well, the same old birthday, but it only happens once every four years. Other leap babies, who are today turning 16 on their 4th birthday or 84 on their 21st birthday or just 4 on their 1st birthday, have their own opinions. For me, it is simply an excuse to post a themed collection of otherwise random links. So... what’s the deal with Leap Day? John at Cosmic…
Leap through Labor to Leap through Labor to Leap I created a bit of ambiguous poetry recently, and I simply couldn’t resist trying another. And well, it is Leap Day, after all... which is also my birthday, so it seems like a good time for a "free choice" fractal. That said, I couldn’t bring myself to simply post the art and line. I’d fidget all weekend wondering if anyone understood it. Even if I do explain, it still may not make any sense. When I initially started to create this fractal (from a formula ambiguously named Andrextrandom) I called it "Flight", for several reasons. Most…
Oh, that fresh Rocky Mountain stream water... sparkling snowmelt, flowing from the ancient peaks to the broad plains, teeming with hermaphroditic fish. Hermaphroditic fish, you say? Like, fish with male parts and female parts, all in one? In our streams? Ok... well, maybe not everywhere... just downstream from where we use the bathroom. Hormonal disruption seems to be in the news quite a bit lately. Endocrine disrupters have been found in our food containers, and by proxy, our food. Every once in a while, a report on these hormonal substances is highlighted in the mainstream media, stirring…
"A feminine text cannot fail to be more than subversive. It is volcanic; as it is written it brings about an upheaval of the old property crust, carrier of masculine investments; there’s no other way. There’s no room for her if she’s not a he. If she’s a her-she, it’s in order to smash everything, to shatter the framework of institutions, to blow up the law, to break up the truth with laughter. For once she blazes her trail in the symbolic, she cannot fail to make of it the chaosmos of the personal--in her pronouns, her nous, and her clique of referents.... On the one hand she has…
This weekend’s fractal isn’t very late, when you consider its roots are found 50 million years in the past. The earth was a bit different then... think of it as a post-global-warming world, where greenhouse gasses have already run amok, driving global temperatures. The poles are virtually frost-free, and rainforests reach far into the northern latitudes. Some of our familiar coastline is entirely underwater, including Florida, Louisiana, and a large swath of Texas. On the other side, most of California and Oregon isn’t quite done yet... large chunks of it are still sliding up from Mexico. The…
I hadn’t planned to write another post full of complaints. I’m a mother; I intrinsically hate whining. Yet, here I am, with nothing but frustration and disappointment (and an awful pun in the title) to share. Here it is, in a nutshell: I missed my lab in the field yesterday. It was one of those moments where life is chaos, pure and simple. I left for Boulder early, only to face slippery roads (covered in several inches of slush from Monday’s snowstorm) and heavy traffic. I made it to the park-n-ride where I catch a regional bus at what would normally be a reasonable time. If the busses were…
School can be fun. Tomorrow, I’ll be heading up into the mountains outside of Boulder for my first official in-the-field lab. I’ll be the first to admit, I’m more of a research and writing person than an experimental and field work sort of person. Since I hope to make a career out of science writing, I’m particularly eager to get this sort of hands on experience. So, what will I be doing in the mountains, exactly? I’ll be looking at ponderosa pine trees (Pinus ponderosa). Well, not just looking at them, but measuring them (height and width at breast height), taking core samples, and noting…
I figured I'd post this fractal set while it is still Friday somewhere (here in Colorado, for instance.) My thoughts on it follow below. Flying in Vapor: A poem and a fractal for riding the waves I know what it's like To be down in the water And tossed by the waves Each day, crashing into the next Pulling me, seething, frothing Falling Exhilarating ride through time Through the tumbling surf Dance on the shimmering crests Only then to be pushed beneath Into the surrounding, suffocating Cold Plunging and diving Grows wearisome after a while And so I'll ride above Flying, so to speak…
I don’t know what it is... maybe weeks with holidays in them will naturally cause writer’s block. Indeed, writers probably need an occasional break from their craft, just like anyone else. Unfortunately, they tend to feel more like a block than a break. I’ve had a few things lined up to write about, mostly the usual environmental science news along with a few oddities, and, naturally, a Friday Fractal. That’s where my recent block/break forced itself on me. I finished the fractal, no problem. I’ve been working on a large fractal art project lately, so those come easily. The fractal was fine;…
I really ought to be working, writing or replying to comments, perhaps reading for my literature class. Instead I find myself lured outside into the bitter cold. My cat, however well his white fur blends with the snow-covered ground, must be freezing on such a night. Yet there he is, perched on the fresh-cut pine of our back fence. So, there I am, following, trying to see what he sees. Aha... it must be the moon: But here the camera lies, for what a beautiful moon it is. Mars is nearby, but the lens won't pick it up. If the clouds were much thicker, the eye probably couldn't either. Mars isn…
The following fractal is a tribute to our new overlords, Dendroctonus ponderosae. Lindenmayer Trees and Fractal Brownian Motion I wrote about the role of pine beetles in Colorado’s future last week. The conclusion of that piece: a slight rise in temperatures means a strong advantage for pine beetles, which will be able to decimate Colorado’s vast lodgepole pine forests, thus increasing fire danger and erosion, not to mention damaging our tourism. Well, our annual aerial survey of the forests was completed recently, and the news isn’t good: The growth of the beetle epidemic affecting…
A new concern arose around the turn of the 21st century, among the advancements in technology and science: what is the future of our planet's climate? This is a bold question, considering traditional problems with predicting the future. We have no evidence of future events, due to the asymmetry of time. It is difficult even to reconcile different interpretations of present conditions, because of epistemological flaws in our methods of observation. In the face of such uncertainties, and with fortunetelling abandoned along with magical thinking many years before, can science provide useful…