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Tag Archives: science
The Two Cultures in 2011
From The Ten Things Everyone Should Know About Science
Scientists have been complaining for decades that, while they would be ashamed to admit knowing nothing about Jane Austen’s novels, literary colleagues can get away with total ignorance of relativity and quantum theory. Continue reading
Dark Matter: Still needed
There was a recent media kerfuffle about MOND (Modified Newtonian Dynamics), an alternative physical theory that supposedly eliminates the need to have dark matter be a major part of the universe.
Politics and the AntiVaccination Movement
From Why the ‘Prius Driving, Composting’ Set Fears Vaccines
I talked to a public health official and asked him what’s the best way to anticipate where there might be higher than normal rates of vaccine noncompliance, and he said take a map and put a pin wherever there’s a Whole Foods. I sort of laughed, and he said, “No, really, I’m not joking.” It’s those communities with the Prius driving, composting, organic food-eating people.
More nuts at the Puff Ho
Not content with anti-vaccination nonsense, which I have noted before, you can also find Pseudo-Astronomy at the Huffington Post.
Get the facts at Betelgeuse and 2012 and Will Betelgeuse Really Become a Second Sun in 2012?.
US university settles religious discrimination case
At Physics World:
A settlement has been reached in a case brought against the University of Kentucky by astrophysicist Martin Gaskell over his claim that the university illegally denied him a staff position on the basis of his evangelical Christian faith. The settlement now requires the university to pay $125,000 to Gaskell and his lawyers, who claimed that the decision meant Gaskell lost income and caused him “emotional distress”. The university admits no wrongdoing in the case, which was due to go to trial on 8 February. Meanwhile, Gaskell has taken a job at Chile’s University of Valparaiso, which he will start in March.
Following up on the Gaskell affair.
Learning Chemistry ….
The Gaskell affair
Scientists and Crackpots.
The Truth Is Out There : The Last Word On Nothing
“Here’s the deal,” he [the scientist] went on. “What we’re doing is weirder and more interesting than anything you’re already imagining.”
That argument, too, went nowhere. But it was worth a try, I think, because it’s the truth.
From Hilbert Space to Dilbert Space, and beyond 