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pgleick | March 6, 2014In the last few months, as the severe California drought has garnered attention among scientists, policymakers, and media, there has been a growing debate about the links between the drought and climate change. The debate has been marked by considerable controversy, confusion, and opaqueness.
The confusion stems from the failure of some scientists, bloggers, reporters, and others to distinguish among three separate questions. All three questions are scientifically interesting. But the three are different in their nuance, their importance to policy, and their interest to politicians and water…
jrosenhouse | March 4, 2014We just had our second straight snow day around here (in a winter that has already had a lot of snow days). That did provide me with some unexpected free time, which I used to watch the big debate between Sean Carroll and William Lane Craig. All two and a quarter hours of it! Click here for the video.
If you're unfamiliar with the players here, Sean Carroll is a physicist at CalTech, specializing in cosmology. He is the author of a terrific book called From Eternity to Here: The Search for the Ultimate Theory of Time. More recently he is the author of The Particle at the End of The…
jrosenhouse | March 2, 2014Throughout this series I have endeavored to bring to your attention some of the major themes that problem composers use. So far, though, there is one big one that has not been featured. I am referring to Allumwandlung, typically abbreviated AUW. This is a German word that translates loosely as “All conversion.” To chess composers it refers to a problem in which promotions to all four pieces (queen, rook, bishop and knight) appear in the course of the problem. A lovely example appears in the current issue of The Problemist, which is the official magazine of The British Chess Problem…
jrosenhouse | March 1, 2014The book review I discussed in Wednesday's post is an example of a “hatchet job.” This is a literary form in which the goal is not merely to criticize an opponent's work, but to show that it is utterly worthless. Hatchet jobs are often marked by large amounts of snark and snideness, often at the expense of making a cogent argument.
Such was the case in the essay at the heart of Wednesday's post. We were discussing William Deresiewicz's review of the book Jane Austen: Game Theorist, which was written by UCLA political scientist Mark Suk-Young Chwe. The review appeared in The New Republic,…
gregladen | March 1, 2014The 69th carnival of evolution is up at Scientific American's S.E. Gould's Lab Rat Blog. HERE.
gregladen | February 28, 2014I will be giving a talk in Saint Paul, at the Best Western Kelly Inn, on Evolutionary Psychology.
The original plan was to get two people to debate the topic, but it was hard to find two people in town to do that. One idea was to get PZ Myers over here, and then he and I would debate the topic. Problem with that is that we probably agree a lot more than we disagree so that would be boring. Well, I'm sure we'd make it interesting but we'd have to switch topics.
So it ended up being me. There will be a debate. I'll handle both sides. Seriously.
I'd love to give you a working link to…
gregladen | February 28, 2014... OK, it doesn't really make sense, but that's actually the point.
I object to the radicalized stereotypes but they're British, they don't know better. Otherwise this is catchy.
gregladen | February 28, 2014Powered bikes have been around for a long time, and there are many electric bikes available now. But it seems that this new one is a significant change from prior versions.
The Faraday Bike doesn't even look like it could possibly be powered. But apparently it is. The frame is, more or less, the battery. The motor is small because electric motors can be small. It has a computer, and apparently, LED lights.
It does not operate without human power, but it adds power to your stroke, by about 300% (but that is adjustable) according to the manufacturer.
It costs a mere $3,500. But it is…
jrosenhouse | February 27, 2014I sometimes write about the relationship of the problem of evil to evolution. Darwinian natural selection is a rather unpleasant business, you see, making you wonder why a loving God would employ it as his method of creation. My experience with anti-evolutionists has been that this is a point of special concern for them. Virtually every book proposing to reconcile evolution with Christianity devotes a chapter to this (or at least a major section), and some theologians write whole books about it. I devote a chapter to it in Among the Creationists.
You hardly need Darwin to point out that…
jrosenhouse | February 26, 2014Upon surveying the American landscape these days, it's hard to believe that an over-reliance on science is something we need to worry about. That hasn't stopped some in the humanities from manufacturing the entirely fictitious threat of “scientism.” It's a hard term to pin down, since it is seldom defined the same way twice, but mostly it just means that someone is whining about the lack of respect accorded to his discipline. Theologians and philosophers seem especially keen on leveling the charge.
It certainly happens occasionally that someone writing in the name of science intrudes into…
jrosenhouse | February 25, 2014It's time to get caught up on a few things. The Nye/Ham debate attracted reams of commentary, some of it sensible, some not so much. Two of the sillier entries came from William Saletan over at Slate He's very worked up about Bill Nye's claim that creationism poses a threat to our scientific future. Saletan writes:
Ham presented videos from several scientists who espoused young-Earth creationism. One said he had invented the MRI scanner. Another said he had designed major components of spacecraft launched by NASA and the European Space Agency. If the spacecraft guy had botched his work,…
jrosenhouse | February 22, 2014Regular blogging will resume next week, once I have finished digging out from the pile of work that didn't get done during my recent travels. But since Sunday Chess Problem waits for nobody, I've picked out a tasty little morsel for you.
One of my favorite motifs in chess is that of a fortress draw. This refers to a position that is drawn simply because the attacker has no possible way of making progress against the defender's set-up. Typically the term is applied to a situation in which the defender is down a substantial amount of material, so that it is surprising that the attacker…
gregladen | February 20, 2014I'd love to describe the details to you but I don't think I can ever do as good a job as Representative Henry Waxman and Senator Sheldon Whitehouse. They wrote a letter to McCain and Gingrich. Gave 'em a good shellacking, they did. I love this letter so much I'm giving it to you three times. First, as a picture of the letter because it is so cool looking. Then, as a transcript so it is searchable. Then, as a link to a PDF file.
And now, here is the text, from here:
February 20, 2014
The Honorable John McCain
241 Russell Senate Office Building
Washington, DC 20510
The Honorable Newt…
illconsidered | February 18, 2014Via a blog posting on NPR, below is an excerpt from the recent Academy Award nominated documentary "Chasing Ice" showing highlights of a 75 minute glacier calving event recorded in Greenland.
At the end is a time-lapse sequence of the entire event along with some visuals to put the size in perspective. Really amazing stuff!
While on the subject of metaphors, this is a nice example of processes that are in general very slow moving but when tipping points are reached suddenly and dramatically accelerate. Climate change is such a process, this is rather scary. But so are social and political…
jrosenhouse | February 11, 2014I've had a chance now to watch Questioning Darwin. Twice. Short review: I liked it quite a bit. Now for the long review.
I'm obviously a bit partial, since this film represents my television debut! I was one of the talking heads interviewed in the film, and it was a thrill to be in the company of people like Rebecca Stott, Steve Jones and James Moore, among others. I show up around forty-five minutes in, to say a few things about the Scopes trial and the importance of Sputnik in bringing the creationism issue back to prominence in the United States. It was a lot of fun, and I enjoyed…
jrosenhouse | February 10, 2014Blogging is likely to be light for the next week or so. I'm gearing up for some traveling, starting at the end of the week. On Thursday I'll leave for Chicago, to participate in the annual AAAS Conference. Over the weekend I will be in Parsippany, New Jersey to participate in the annual chess extravaganza known as the U. S. Amateur Team East. Me and my homeys are getting together for another, no doubt forlorn, go at the title. Then on Tuesday I'll be in Princeton to meet with an editor from Princeton University Press to discuss a new project. Stay tuned on that one!
Sadly, because of…
lborkowski | February 10, 2014A few of the recent pieces I've liked:
Karen Bouffard in The Detroit News: Infant mortality rate in Detroit rivals areas of Third World (via Reporting on Health, which has links to other stories in this series)
Stephanie McCrummen in the Washington Post: Life after Jan. 1: Kentucky clinic offers early glimpse at realities of health-care law
Harold Pollack interviews Keith Humphreys at Wonkblog: 100 Americans die of drug overdoses each day. How do we stop that?
Rachel Aviv in the New Yorker: A Valuable Reputation ("After Tyrone Hayes said that a chemical was harmful, its maker pursued him")…
jrosenhouse | February 9, 2014Some chess problems are the equivalent of a big, Thanksgiving dinner. They have numerous variations and complex strategy. And that's fine, if a big dinner is what you want.
Sometimes, though, you just want a pleasant little amuse bouche. And that's what we have today. The problem below was composed by William Shinkman, one of the finest chess composers of the nineteenth century. It is white to move and mate in three.
Remember that white is moving up the board and black is moving down the board. Vertical files are labeled from left to right as a--h, while horizontal ranks are…
