clock | February 10, 2009This appears to be from Google: GPeerReview:
We intend for the peer-review web to do for scientific publishing what the world wide web has done for media publishing. As it becomes increasingly practical to evaluate researchers based on the reviews of their peers, the need for centralized big-name journals begins to diminish. The power is returned to those most qualified to give meaningful reviews: the peers. As long as big journals provide a useful service, this tool will only enhance their effectiveness. But the more they take months to review our publications, and the more they give…
clock | February 10, 2009No, really, it was Anne-Marie's idea. She started it! Yeah, don't look at me!
Charles Darwin is on Twitter, Alfred Wallace is on Twitter, Richard Owen is on Twitter, even Bishop Wilberforce (aka Soapy Sam) is on Twitter. Where is Huxley?
We are already having fun retweeting non-existent Darwin tweets ;-) I hope the real Darwin and others respond with humorous stuff:
@BoraZ I can see it; "@arwallace: damn!"
Bora: @rowen next time I'll block you!
BoraZ: RT @cdarwin Please: need info on modification/domestication in pigeons for a book
BoraZ: RT @cdarwin w00t! Going on a cruise: Argentina,…
clock | February 10, 2009New Species Of Prehistoric Creatures Discovered In Isle Of Wight Mud:
In just four years a University of Portsmouth palaeontologist has discovered 48 new species from the age of the dinosaurs. Dr Steve Sweetman's discoveries, found hidden in mud on the Isle of Wight, are around 130 million years old and shed valuable light on the poorly understood world in which well known dinosaurs roamed.
Alzheimer's Prevented And Reversed With Natural Protein In Animal Models:
Memory loss, cognitive impairment, brain cell degeneration and cell death were prevented or reversed in several animal models after…
clock | February 9, 2009When important decisions have to be taken, the natural anxiety to come to a right decision will often keep you awake. Nothing, however, is more conducive to healthful sleep than plenty of open air.
- Sir John Lubbock
clock | February 9, 2009The 8th edition of Hourglass is up on SharpBrains.
The 166th edition of the Carnival of The Green is up on Lighter Footstep
clock | February 9, 2009I will be on a panel, Open Science: Good For Research, Good For Researchers? next week, February 19th (3:00 to 5:00 pm EST at Columbia University, Morningside Campus, Shapiro CEPSR Building, Davis Auditorium). I am sure my hosts will organize something for us that day before and/or after the event, but Mrs.Coturnix and I will be there a couple of days longer. So, I think we should have a meetup - for Overlords, SciBlings, Nature Networkers, independent bloggers, readers and fans ;-)
Is Friday evening a good time for this? Or is Saturday better? Let me know.
You can follow the panel on…
clock | February 9, 2009There are 15 new articles published Friday night and 15 new articles published tonight in PLoS ONE. As always, you should rate the articles, post notes and comments and send trackbacks when you blog about the papers. You can now also easily place articles on various social services (CiteULike, Connotea, Stumbleupon, Facebook and Digg) with just one click. Here are my own picks for the week - you go and look for your own favourites:
Impact of Climate Change on the Relict Tropical Fish Fauna of Central Sahara: Threat for the Survival of Adrar Mountains Fishes, Mauritania:
Four central Sahara…
clock | February 9, 2009
As you may remember, this week we have a special guest here in the Triangle - Carl Zimmer is coming to enjoy NC BBQ and, since he's already here on the 12th, to give the Darwin Day talk at the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences in Raleigh (directions):
"Darwin and Beyond: How Evolution Is Evolving"
February 12, 2009
6:30 pm - 7:30 pm
Please join us for a Darwin Day presentation by Carl Zimmer. Mr. Zimmer is well known for his popular science writing, particularly his work on evolution. He has published several books including Soul Made Flesh, a history of the brain, Evolution: The…
clock | February 9, 2009Census Of Modern Organisms Reveals Echo Of Ancient Mass Extinction:
Paleontologists can still hear the echo of the death knell that drove the dinosaurs and many other organisms to extinction following an asteroid collision at the end of the Cretaceous Period 65 million years ago.
New Bird Species: New Species Of Babbler Discovered In China:
A new species of babbler has been described from Guangxi province in south-west China close to the border with Vietnam. Named Nonggang Babbler Stachyris nonggangensis, after the reserve at which it was discovered, this new species is closely related to…
clock | February 8, 2009There is no force so powerful as an idea whose time has come.
- Everett McKinley Dirksen
clock | February 7, 2009A dog teaches a boy fidelity, perseverance, and to turn around three times before lying down.
- Robert Charles Benchley
clock | February 7, 2009Science coverage in New York Times is good because they can afford a whole stable of people, each expert in one field only. If Carl Zimmer was forced to cover, on a daily basis and without time to research, everything from astronomy and physics to archaeology and materials science, he would do a bad job, too. But he is given time to pick his own area - evolution - to study it for years, and to write whatever the heck he wants on any given week. So Carl is an expert on what he is writing.
A small paper with one science beat reporter will have to cover everything and that reporter will thus…
clock | February 7, 2009I've been on Facebook since the beginning, in 2005. I explored it and studied it. I always spent minimal amount of time on it, though. I get e-mail notifications and perhaps once a day go there to click on all the "Ignore" buttons for all the invitations. So, I do not see is as a big time drain. But every now and then I get useful piece of information there, or an invitation to something I want to attend. I also use it to monitor what my kids are doing there. It is also nice to reconnect to some people I have not heard of in 20-30 years and see what they are doing.
I am on my third set of…
clock | February 7, 2009When I see news on MSM I check with trusted bloggers if the news is to be believed. Trusted bloggers? Takes time and work to find out who.
I automatically do NOT believe anything coming from corporate media. I check blogs to see what they say if I catch some news on MSM first (rarely these days). Some blogs can be trusted 100% of the time, some 90%, some occasionally, some never. It takes time and effort to figure out who is who, but that effort is worth it - you get immunized from MSM lies. You also learn the skills of critically reading between the lines of MSM and evaluating their "news"…
clock | February 7, 2009Who has power?
Elected officials: they write, vote for and sign laws, they decide how much money will be collected from whom and how it will be spent, they decide on starting and stopping wars, i.e., lives and deaths of people.
Who else has power?
Anyone who can affect the decision of an elected official, e.g., to change a vote from Yes to No or vice versa.
How does one do that?
By having money and using it wisely.
How does one use money to affect policy?
One: by directly lobbying the elected officials. Two: by buying off the media.
I understand how One works, but Two?
Elected officials…
clock | February 7, 2009If Huffington Post wants to have credibility and gain its vaunted #1 spot as the most trusted online new source, there is only one thing it needs to do - ditch the woomeisters Chopra and RFK Jr., and get in their place some people from the reality-based community.
People are sick of conservative, emotion-based, gut-feeling decision-making that screwed up the country over the past 28 years. Why allowing the Left fringe equivalents into the mix? It is them that make a lot of people untrusting of Huffington Post.
Will Huffington Post publish and defend this piece about the potential fraud…
clock | February 7, 2009Wolf In Dog's Clothing? Black Wolves May Be First 'Genetically Modified' Predators:
Slipping through trees or across snow, the wolf has glided into legend on paws of white, gray or -- in North America -- even black. This last group owes an unexpected debt to the cousins of the domestic dog, say Stanford researchers. In an unconventional evolutionary twist, dogs that bred with wolves thousands of years ago ceded a genetic mutation encoding dark coat color to their former ancestors. As a result, the Gray Wolf, or Canis lupus, is no longer just gray.
'Nonsense' In Our Genes: One In 200 Human…
clock | February 6, 2009I value the friend who for me finds time on his calendar, but I cherish the friend who for me does not consult his calendar.
- Robert Brault
clock | February 6, 2009Jay Rosen and Glenn Greenwald, two of the shrapest bloggers ever, were on Bill Moyers's Journal on PBS tonight.
You SHOULD watch the video and read the transcript here.
