silliness

As a parent of a newly mobile one-year-old, I have a can't-fail suggestion for a toy product that would fuse two popular technologies: realistic infant simulators (baby dolls that cry, wet themselve, etc.) and vacuum-cleaning robots. All you need to do is mount a baby doll on a Roomba chassis, and use the same random-walk algorithm they use for the vacuum cleaners. Have the doll wander around completely at random, occasionally bumping into things. Anything small on the floor gets picked up, and stuck in the doll's mouth. For bonus realism points, have it stop at random intervals for no…
I have a thousand things to do today, and blogging isn't high on the list. So here's a dorky poll to pass the time, because it's been a while: What's your favorite Law of Thermodynamics?(polls) We're working in the classical limit, here, so you're not allowed to choose a linear superposition of all four laws. Pick one as your favorite.
Last week, Sean raised the critical academic question of when to serve food associated with a seminar talk. He did not, however, address the more important question, namely what to serve at a seminar talk. So I'll do it, scientific-like: Which of the following items should be served at an event associated with an academic talk (check all that apply):(answers) And, just in case you feel left out of Sean's original discussion: The food at an academic seminar talk should be served:(polling) The posting of this has nothing to do with the fact that I've been organizing the summer student seminar…
Here at ScienceBlogs, we're generally fans of the Discovery Channel. MythBusters is great. Man vs. Wild is thrilling. Planet Earth is, of course, one of the most sublime ways to spend an hour—or if you're lucky enough to get your hands on the boxed DVD collection, eleven hours. Straight. But we just can't get behind Shark Week. Here's the thing: Shark Week has been airing annually since 1987. Every summer for over twenty years, people have gathered to their television sets to learn about how to defeat a Great White if attacked (punch it in the nose), and how long sharks have been around for…
In the same basic vein as yesterday's post about thermodynamics, the following poll contains a list of physicists who are not household names, but who made significant contributions to the science of optics. Which of them is the best? Which of these physicists from the field of optics was the best?(polls)
Dope A. Mean and the Glut-Tang Clan may not be a household name yet, but if the debut video of their smash hit Synaptic Cleft is any indication, they're poised to be the breakout group of the summer. S to the YNAPSE!
Moon walk. Moonwalk It's been a good 40 years.
As noted earlier, I'm not at my sharpest, thanks to this past weekend's festivities. Which means I don't have any deep-thinking blog posts in the queue, and the hundreds of posts piled up in Google Reader since later Thursday were just marked read without more than a cursory glance. Since I'm at a loss for material, here's your chance to program the blog: Leave a comment asking me a question, and I will answer it either in comments or in a post. The one important qualifier here is that the questions should be easy. I'm too tired for hard questions, today. There are no topic restrictions--…
I've got a couple more things to say about Unscientific America, probably, but I opted for some more David Foster Wallace last night, and don't feel like typing them up now, so I'll give you all a break. Anyway, what you're really here for is the baby and dog stuff, so here's another poll question from Emmy: Cats are(survey) (I think you should be able to choose multiple answers to this one, but I'm not 100% sure I set it up right.)
A reading from the Book of Genesis: 1 And the whole earth was of one language, and of one speech. 2 And it came to pass, as they journeyed from the east, that they found a plain in the land of Shinar; and they dwelt there. 3 And they said one to another, Go to, let us make plastic cups that can stack atop one another. And let us make them of many colors, lo, for that would be cool. 4 And they said, Go to, let us stack our cups to make a tower, whose top may reach unto heaven; and let us put a duck upon the top, because ducks are pretty neat. 5 And SteelyKid came down to see the city and the…
After a long baby-induced delay, we are finally ready to announce the winners of the How to Teach Physics to Your Dog Caption Contest and Poetry Contest. I've obtained a few more copies of the bound galleys from the publisher, so we'll be giving two awards in each contest category: one for each photo, one for Cuttlefish poetry, and one for non-Cuttlefish poetry. And the winners are: Photo 1: The award goes to Nick at #25: Photo 2: The award goes to Eric Goebelbecer at #8: Honorable Mention: Dave W. at #11 and Konrad at #30. Let's ask the judges what they thought: Chad: All three of the…
SteelyKid's nearly over her coxsackie virus, but has just enough spots left that we can't take her to day care. Which means another day of baby wrangling, and another poll question chosen by the dog: What is the biggest single threat to your household security?(surveys) Emmy is convinced that we're insufficiently serious about home defense.
"What are you doing?" "Hmm? Oh, I'm trying to think of a Dorky Poll question to post to the blog, because I'm going to be away from the computer for a while." "Why are they always human polls?" "Um, because the vast majority of my readers are human?" Yeah, but why don't I ever get to pick poll questions, huh?" "OK, fine. What's your question?" What are you chasing?(survey software)
Just a quick reminder post to note that you can win an advance proof copy of How to Teach Physics to Your Dog in one of two ways: By captioning pictures of the dog with physics apparatus By writing short poems about dogs and physics Regarding the last one, I'm thinking of adding a second poetry prize for "Best poem by somebody who isn't the Cuttlefish." So if you've been intimidated by squidly verse, don't be... Entries for both contests are open through this Sunday, June 28th.
Via email, a news story from San Francisco with the headline "Physics discussion ends in skateboard attack": A homeless man is on trial in San Mateo County on charges that he smacked a fellow transient in the face with a skateboard as the victim was engaged in a conversation about quantum physics, authorities said today. Jason Everett Keller, 40, allegedly accosted another homeless man, Stephan Fava, on the 200 block of Grand Avenue in South San Francisco at about 1:45 p.m. March 30. At the time, Fava was chatting with an acquaintance, who is also homeless, about "quantum physics and the…
There once was a dog from Niskayuna... The previous post announced a photo caption contest for a chance to win an advance proof copy of my book, How to Teach Physics to Your Dog, six(-ish) months before it's available for purchase. I thought I should include something for the less visually inclined, though, and I do have two extra galley proofs, so... Announcing the Official How to Teach Physics to Your Dog Poetry contest. The idea is simple: write a short poem involving both dogs and physics in one of the usual short verse forms (haiku, limerick, double dactyl, whatever, as long as it has…
Today is six months to the day from the official release date of my book, How to Teach Physics to Your Dog. It feels like I ought to do something promotion-like to mark this date, and I have a couple of extra bound galley proofs (seen above with Emmy), sooo..... I hereby announce the first of two contests giving you, the blog reader, a chance to win an uncorrected galley proof copy of the book six months (ish) before you can buy it. The idea is simple: below the fold are two pictures that just cry out for amusing captions of some sort. The person who comes up with the best caption will get…
The recurrent timeout problem in the comments has been dragging on and on, but I'm not sure how much of a problem it is for you, the end user, as opposed to me, the guy who has to endure six timeouts while clearing out Turkish dating service spam. Of course, I can't very well ask people to leave comments about how messed-up the comments are, so I've been forced to resort to something higher-tech: The commenting problems at ScienceBlogs are:(polls) I'm torn as to whether to use this for Dorky Polls in the future-- the ease of clicking might make people more likely to respond, but half the fun…
This weekend, with spring in the air, ScienceBloggers left their computers and stepped into the wild outdoors. However, as evidenced by the blog entries they scurried to post shortly thereafter, these are not individuals who take a lazy day off from science. From photographing an unidentified turtle to an alluringly blue pansy, these scientists are constantly observing the world around them with an admirable dose of curiosity. Turtle in front of my house on A Blog Around the Clock Photo of the Day #602: Horseshoe crab on Laelaps More Manhattan Blues on Living the Scientific Life Is there an…