innovation

Mark Buchanan, quoting Lee Smolin, on how big science may be biased against innovative iconoclasts: Some scientists, he suggests, are what we might call "hill climbers". They tend to be highly skilled in technical terms and their work mostly takes established lines of insight that pushes them further; they climb upward into the hills in some abstract space of scientific fitness, always taking small steps to improve the agreement of theory and observation. These scientists do "normal" science. In contrast, other scientists are more radical and adventurous in spirit, and they can be seen as "…
Over at Ask MetaFilter, a kind of Yahoo! Answers for the cognoscenti, user lizzicide wanted a system that would alert her if her car was towed. Apparently the moderators didn't rate my answer, because it's gone now. Good thing Isaved it for posterity. Text reads: There's a good chance my car might get towed at any time. So, what are my options for tracking my car's movement (possible via GPS) when it's not turned on and I'm not in it? This is probably not possible, but I'd like to be able to tell if my car is being towed. Since it'll most likely be towed in the middle of the night while I'…