Links Dump
drorzel | April 15, 2008
Meeting Announcment HTML Email
Including the classic anti-quack essay "DRIVE THE PSEUDOS OUT OF THE WORKSHOP OF SCIENCE," by the late J. A. Wheeler, albeit in a nearly unreadable format.
(tags: science stupid medicine psychology physics quantum)
Fighting Gossip With Graphics :: Inside Higher Ed :: Higher Education's Source for News, and Views and Jobs
Princeton accentuates the positive.
(tags: academia education society culture internet)
Large Hadron Collider - Risk of a Black Hole - Dennis Overbye - Physics - New York Times
People who aren't crazy think about the odds.
(tags: physics…
drorzel | April 10, 2008
A thought -- Words Words Words -- The Dream Cafe Weblog
"If President Bush has sunk lower than others, it is only because he is being stood on by giants."
(tags: US politics silly)
Mythbusters' Jamie Hyneman and Adam Savage | The A.V. Club
Zombie Feynman says it's science, and that's good enough for me.
(tags: science television education society culture gadgets experiment)
Poll results: look who's doping : Nature News
"One in five respondents[ to a poll in Nature] said they had used drugs for non-medical reasons to stimulate their focus, concentration or memory."
(tags: science news…
drorzel | April 9, 2008
Satisfying application of physics
Another great idea for an intro mechanics lab.
(tags: physics academia education experiment science)
Michigan laser beam believed to set record for intensity
Includes a great lab-porn picture of the laser in action.
(tags: science physics optics news experiment)
'U.S. News' Adds Surveys That Could Alter Methodology :: Inside Higher Ed :: Higher Education's Source for News, and Views and Jobs
"The magazine has sent out surveys to 1,600 high school counseling offices asking them to evaluate colleges, and the results may be used in next year's rankings. Or…
drorzel | April 8, 2008
Most powerful laser in the world fires up
"The Texas Petawatt laser reached greater than one petawatt of laser power on Monday morning, March 31," Good thing, or they'd feel pretty dumb about the name.
(tags: physics optics science news)
Cats Laughing
Everybody's favorite band of SF authors, on the Intenet.
(tags: SF music internet)
Affirmative Action Challenged Anew :: Inside Higher Ed :: Higher Education's Source for News, and Views and Jobs
(tags: academia diversity race education politics US law)
Researchers take step toward creating quantum computers using entangled photons in…
drorzel | April 7, 2008
Administrating « Confused at a higher level
"Why did I say yes to the Dean when he asked whether I would take on this position? He made the request/offer to me a week after calling me to let me know I had tenure -- he claimed that this gave me a fair shot at saying no."
(tags: academia society culture science physics math education)
College Isn't Worth a Million Dollars :: Inside Higher Ed :: Higher Education's Source for News, and Views and Jobs
Squabbling over how much more a college graduate earns than a high-school graduate. This completely ignores quality-of-life issues.
(tags:…
drorzel | April 6, 2008
In Web World of 24/7 Stress, Writers Blog Till They Drop - New York Times
"To be sure, there is no official diagnosis of death by blogging, and the premature demise of two people obviously does not qualify as an epidemic. "
(tags: blogs writing journalism society culture computing internet)
Calorimeters for High Energy Physics experiments - part 1 « A Quantum Diaries Survivor
A detailed exploration of high energy physics hardware.
(tags: physics experiment science)
Meteorites delivered the 'seeds' of Earth's left-hand life
This seems to be a narrow argument about chirality, rather than…
drorzel | April 5, 2008
PHD Comics: Campus architecture
"Sure, the could have built three building for the same price, but those buildings would be functional and non-leaking."
(tags: academia comics silly)
Baby's Named a Bad, Bad Thing
"I once met a lady named Rodana. I think she runs a successful internet business." "In her spare time she destroys Tokyo."
(tags: culture silly stupid society)
Swans on Tea » Don't Waste Your Money
Do you really need a 576 megapixel digital camera?
(tags: physics optics pictures science biology gadgets)
drorzel | April 4, 2008
Inactive kids face 6-fold risk of heart disease by teen years, study finds
Correlation or causation?
(tags: education medicine US social-science science news)
Reassigned Time: PSEUDONYMITY is not Anonymity, duh
"Pseudonymity is not about being untraceable but rather about taking on a traceable identity that is distinct from one's legal identity, or one's identity at birth. It's about taking on a "pen name," a name that people can follow, and by extension a way o
(tags: blogs academia writing society culture)
drorzel | April 3, 2008
VQR » The Christian with Four Aces
A biography of the deeply creepy and corrupt Pat Robertson.
(tags: culture religion television journalism politics US society)
Coming to New York, a Science Event for the Masses - New York Times
"Dr. Bunsen Honeydew, who described himself as being from Muppet Labs, extolled the family-oriented programs. The most important thing they could show, he said, was "that science can be as explosive and violent as any TV program.""
(tags: science education news meetings academia society culture)
World Science Festival -- World Science Festival 2008 - Five Day…
drorzel | April 2, 2008
Analytics According to Captain Kirk
A detailed statistical analysis of the Red Shirt Phenomenon in Star Trek.
(tags: articles economics math psychology statistics television SF silly science)
drorzel | April 1, 2008
Anil Dash: Your April Fool's Day Joke Continues to Suck
"The exception, of course, is if you're doing something truly hysterical or on a magnificent scale. But I fear we won't run into too many of those."
(tags: blogs internet society stupid)
Practical Jokes - Psychology - April Fool! The Purpose of Pranks - New York Times
"In a paper published last year, three psychologists argued that the sensation of being duped -- anger, self-blame, bitterness -- was such a singular cocktail that it forced an uncomfortable kind of self-awareness. How much of a dupe am I? Where are my
(tags: psychology…
drorzel | March 31, 2008
Hackers Assault Epilepsy Patients via Computer
People suck.
(tags: internet computing medicine evil stupid)
Word Munger » One-letter google searches
The alphabet, according to Google.
(tags: internet computing silly)
The Gashlycrumb Tinies
"M is for Maud who was swept out to sea/ N is for Neville who dies of ennui"
(tags: books comics silly art literature)
Researchers study why high school boys dodge 'Phys Ed'
'"Often boys who don't feel at ease are terrified to go to the locker room or class, fearing they will be mocked for their size, their lack of athletic prowess, or that they…
drorzel | March 30, 2008
Talk Like A Physicist | Talk Like A Physicist 3.14 » A water balloon not exploding in high-speed
Possibly even cooler than a water balloon exploding at high speed.
(tags: physics video youtube science)
THE FIVE WAYS OF PROVING SANTA CLAUS
After Aquinas.
(tags: silly humanities culture society religion)
Boing Boing's Moderation Policy - Boing Boing
How it's done, by the best in the business.
(tags: culture internet blogs society)
Twenty Sided » Blog Archive » DM of the Rings I:The Copious Backstory
The Lord of the Rings movies as a hack-and-slash D&D campaign.
(tags: comics…
drorzel | March 29, 2008
The 6 Cutest Animals That Can Still Destroy You | Cracked.com
Oh shit! Run!
(tags: animals biology psychology video science silly)
Asking a Judge to Save the World, and Maybe a Whole Lot More - New York Times
Crazy people seek an injunction to keep the LHC from destroying the universe.
(tags: physics science stupid)
Of Two Minds : Science on Television : Ask a ScienceBlogs Reader
"If you could be in charge of a new program on the channel of your choice and had an unlimited budget what kind of show would you create?"
(tags: blogs science television society culture education)
The Quantum…
drorzel | March 29, 2008
Anachronista: The Simpsons Bayeux Tapestry Couch Scene
It's missing the comet...
(tags: silly television video)
Good Math, Bad Math : Introduction to Linear Regression
The basics of data fitting.
(tags: science math)
Quantum Decoherence Reduction by Increasing the Thermal Bath Temperature
A counter-intuitive result.
(tags: physics quantum science theory articles)
Condensate Fraction in a 2D Bose Gas Measured across the Mott-Insulator Transition
Some quantum phase transition results from my old group at NIST
(tags: physics quantum optics low-temperature science experiment articles)…
drorzel | March 28, 2008There are fewer of them this time, so I'll keep them above the fold.
Graphene
makes for better optical displays - physicsworld.com
"According to the same group of
researchers that first fabricated the 2D sheets of carbon nearly four
years ago, graphene has the ideal optical properties to form the
transparent electrodes in liquid crystal displays (LCDs)."
(tags:
href="http://del.icio.us/orzelc/physics">physics
href="http://del.icio.us/orzelc/materials">materials
href="http://del.icio.us/orzelc/science">science
href="http://del.icio.us/orzelc/experiment">experiment
href="http…
drorzel | March 27, 2008You may or may not have noticed the absence of the "Links for [Date]" posts the last couple of days. There's been some sort of glitch at del.icio.us, and they didn't auto-post the way they usually do. You may or may not have missed them, but I do, so below the fold you'll find the big long list of stuff that would've posted, had things worked as usual (many thanks to Kate for cleaning up the HTML from the del.icio.us source)):
Physics
and Physicists: Accelerator in a Bowl
A nifty tabletop demonstration of a
particle accelerator, using a ping-pong ball and a salad bowl.
(tags:
href="http://…
drorzel | March 23, 2008
Relativity: Measuring the speed of light « Skulls in the Stars
A history of experiments through the ages.
(tags: precision-measurement experiment history science)
Nanocrystals could help recover waste heat - physicsworld.com
"[T]he thermoelectric figure of merit (ZT) for the ingots increased to 1.2 at room temperature (from a value of 1.0 previously). Moreover, they found that the ZT peaks at 1.4 at 100 °C."
(tags: physics materials science news energy experiment nano)
Unsolicited Advice, Part Six: Talking to the Media | Cosmic Variance
A guide to discussing scientific issues with…
drorzel | March 22, 2008
Security Beat
The DHS gets security advice from Larry Niven, Jerry Pournelle, and David Brin. I feel safer already.
(tags: stupid SF war US politics)
States' Data Obscure How Few Finish High School - New York Times
"Like Mississippi, many states use an inflated graduation rate for federal reporting requirements under the No Child Left Behind law and a different one at home. As a result, researchers say, federal figures obscure a dropout epidemic so severe that only
(tags: education politics US academia)
Antihydrogen Production within a Penning-Ioffe Trap
Using magnetic fields to trap the…
drorzel | March 21, 2008
Backreaction: Experimental Traffic Jams
More detail on the Japanese simulation of Washington, DC.
(tags: physics science experiment video youtube)
What is the matter with the universe? - Telegraph
An article on CP violation experiments, which is pretty good, but might be dated=-- I thought BaBar was shut down?
(tags: physics experiment science)
Supersymmetry could be seen in ultracold atoms - physicsworld.com
A bit of over-enthusiastic titling-- something analagous to one sort of super-symmetry might be able to be simulated in BEC's at some point in the future.
(tags: physics theory…