esrosedotblog

Look what the science guys have cooked up for us.

Labels: gay couples, science

There is no limit to the christian sense of persecution.

Something as innocuous as a celebration of Isaac Newton's birth which happened to fall on the day chosen to celebrate Jesus' birth. It has become a thing. Again.

Neil deGrasse Tyson Explains His Controversial Christmas Day Tweet

Not His birthday incidentally. A symbol.

But Newton was real and he has had a material effect on every aspect of our lives. He did have a birth day and this is it.

Of course, someone named Jesus was born and written about extensively but his curriculum vitae is lost in the sands of time.

The christians most often fail to see the limits of their spiritual beliefs. Newton had faith in the scientific method. Had he seen other aspects of his studies he would have changed his reports. Unlike the jesus people who refuse to change anything and call that faith. Some would call it pure ignorance.

Me for example.

It would be more frustrating if it didn't create a nice discussion in which thousands of thinkers will be introduced to Newton's ideas and, perhaps, become a little more skeptical of theologians coopt of the Jesus figure. Or symbol. Or person. See? There is no way out of the rabbit hole if the rabbit is sitting on the top of the entrance.

It amazes me that we cannot have a clear discussion of factual truth without the christers getting their pants in a twist.

Me? In the first weeks of my education at MIT I reproduced Newton's experiments in frosh physics lab.

They gave us the chance to disprove his work. Now that is education where the other is pour it into empty, unquestioning heads.

F does equal ma and I believe that God made it that way for us to use.

Labels: christers, science

Obama has done a lot for the robot people.

All the Times President Obama Was Fascinated by a Robot

Well, I don't think all the times. I remember a lot more.

Obama is cool so many ways that it is hard to remember that he has put the cool into science again.

He has even played soccer with one.

Do the righties have any idea how important science is, that he has the field in front of him. He actually loves this shit.

Labels: obama, robotics, science

NAMED

Scientists Name Extinct Lizard After President

Funny. They would have "yanked it" if he had lost so they wouldn't be seen as piling on. No one said that they would have switched it to Romneydon.

This isn't the actual lizard which is only a few inches long.

Labels: Barack Obama, science

DAYLIGHT

John says that the reason we don't see light at night is that it is all infra-red.

That is what the little film vignette says.

I didn't get it. Or, I think that it is extraordinarily mundane. If that is possible. Extraordinary/mundane.

A more pertinent question is "how come there is daylight?". Or more precisely,"how come there is a lit sky?"

Answer: sunlight scattered through air particles. Sun is gone at night so is skylight.

There is a lot to how questions are posed. You can make something very mundane, extraordinary.

If you don't know what I am talking about see below for Sunday Sept 30.

Labels: astronomy, science

WHY IS IT DARK AT NIGHT?

This seems to be a really good explanation and all but I have to admit that I still don't get it.

I mean it is filled with extraneous facts but nothing to answer the specific question posed.

Or perhaps it does.

Maybe my bad luck with physics still abstains. I am, after all, an MIT graduate but this kind of stuff doesn't work for me.

Maybe I don't listen.

Labels: astronomy, science

LUMP IN THROAT

I have to admit that I felt a bit sad to see the space shuttle coming "home" for it's final resting place,

I have not been much of a fan for the space stuff. I know it is probably important but it doesn't stir me up much.

But I guess it is more under my skin than I thought.

Look at this photo. Imagine standing where those guys are watching the return to the Smithsonian Air Museum.

Labels: science, space

WELL MAYBE ONE POST

This is a big deal, I think.

Simulated Mars mission 'lands' back on Earth

Take a look at the pods.

I couldn't do this. Maybe three days.

I have a tendency to claustrophobia which I have not had to deal with for a long time but I think that this would be the time.

Of course, I have not met the men who I would have to stay with.

I suppose that we aren't supposed to speculate about how they made out sexually. With each other?

I would like to think that I could talk them into it.

I suppose there is some practical application to all this but I, for one, do not believe in space.

Well, I believe that it exists but I do not see the importance of its exploration.

There is the moon. There is the abandoned equipment. Nothing going on. Done, over.

And that one is easy to get to.

We have the Mar's explorers which have way surpassed expectations. Robots.

What could we do with all that money here? Well, start with climate change for one thing. Think about building the infrastructure.

I used to know the guys at the NASA technology transfer office. We used to work on applications for space technology on earth.

There certainly is a lot of spinoff. But, I am led to believe, a minute portion of the GDP.

Anyway I am not going. I wish I had some more pictures of the guys who went in there.

No women. And now we are back to the question. Who did who and how?

I know. You don't want to think about this but there it is.

I look at what photos we have and the gaydar goes off. I will stop now.

Labels: gay life, science

A NEW ERA

This is pretty good if not totally pessimistic.

The Anthropocene Age

The idea is that we have entered a new "age".

We have been in the Holocene age which followed the Pleistocene.

Ages are delineated by layers of geologic sediment.

We have now managed to cover the earth in our own man made layer. Or the beginnings of it.

The seabed is poisoned and the ground is beginning to turn into concrete and asphalt.

They are serious about this.

I suppose we should feel happy to be around for an "age shift". The last one, the Holocene, was just at the dawning of human life. Or something like it.

Of course, this one may be just at the sunset of the same life.

I am agnostic about all this. I don't know what will happen and do not believe in the end any more than I do the triumph of man (and woman) over his/her domain.

I won't be around for even the beginnings of it.

I still wonder if they are having us on about this. Probably not. It isn't a kidding matter, is it. At least not in the opinion pages of the NYTimes.

Labels: rock, science

GETTING A ROUND

This from Dave.

Labels: fun, life, science

IT IS COMING AROUND AGAIN

When I was a kid the whole scene in education was science and engineering.

Now it is coming around again.

This is a really nice video by the Obamas and their education policies.

Labels: Administration Obama, engineering, MIT, science

HOW BAD IS EDUCATION DOING?

Not as badly as you think.

Kevin Drum makes some charts.

How The Kids Are Doing

As a mildly interested and not alarmed grandfather, I am vindicated in my lack of worry about the younger generation.

Yes. There are ethnic disparities.

Work on it.

Labels: science

NOT BUSH LEAGUE PLAYERS

Today, Steven Chu, the Energy Secretary, "signaled" no confidence in the efforts of BP to heal the spill and appointed a team of scientists to move in on the task force currently flailing in the Gulf.

When All Else Fails, Bring in the Scientists

The nut of it is that this administration plays an entirely different game. Not only have they had a superb emergency response, they have the guns to move in on the perps and take over if they have to.

There is a funny story in here about Chu actually knowing something about gamma rays. Imagine. A bureaucrat who knows about, gasp, gamma rays.

To say nothing of having a scientist as a Cabinet Secretary.

This is what he was talking about. Gamma rays coursing through his and the reporter's head as they spoke.

Labels: Administration Obama, science

RACETRACK

My newly developed understanding of quantum physics, leads me to rejoice over this.

Large Hadron Collider Finally Smashing Properly

This whole project has been a slow starter but that is to be expected.

Now I am going to have to get a book on "dark matter".

Labels: science

HOLY FUCKING JESUS

The record distance from "land" in a test of the new space suit navigation system. Read about it here at APOD.

Labels: astropix, science

CHRISTIAN GENOME

This is surprising and reassuring.

The head of the NIH Genome Project is an evangelical christian and does not believe in the creationist nonsense.

Ignorance is Expensive

Read it. It's pretty good.

Sooner or later they are going to have to get their own people into the tent on science.

They will be extinct if that does not happen. The US is swinging back to education. They will have to let go of the childish ideas they are bound to.

It is nice to see christian leaders speak up and reach out.

Incidentally, I don't believe the Gallup poll results on ignorance either. I would like to see the profile and the question and what part of the country the question was asked. 44% of people believing in God creation within 10,000 years is impossible for me to accept.

I don't much believe any polls about such areas of knowledge or concern. Ask who you are voting for, OK. The rest of it requires far more sophistication in design than most polling companies have the resources to accomplish when clients pay them a relatively small amount of money to take a survey.

Labels: christist watch, science

HALF GEEK

I caught that today is pi day but I missed that it is also Einstein's birthday. The convergence being even more 'amazing'. 3.14. Einstein. And so on.

I am not much of a scientist. I let most of my math and physics studies fly away. Balloons in the sky.

I had to take the courses. Four terms.

I have never ever used any of it.

I don't mean to disparage the subjects. I am sure that they made me a better thinker and gave me a grasp of the world that I would not otherwise have. I am a believer in the scientific method even in matters of faith!

Utility is not the only guideline for developing a mental discipline. I don't use long division much either. Or the study of a frog's innards which I did pretty well at. All that biology.

The courses did have a long lasting result on the negative side. I can still have dreams of not being prepared for a quiz or lab report.

Another skill learned? Getting over and past stuff. I copied a lot of other people's lab books over time. Quizzes were less amenable to cheating. I just shut my eyes and gave it my best shot. The power of intuition over logical process.

All of this was good enough to get me a passing grade.

Faking it on intuition may not be an admirable life skill but it is sometimes critical to survival.

Labels: life, science

ENOUGH SAID

Labels: christist watch, science

TWO HUNDRED

Darwin is still working his assertions through the populace.

Gallup says that only 44% believe in "evolution". Which probably says more about how the question was asked than anything else. But maybe.

We are still learning about his work. That is for sure.

The other night we were talking about how the "theory" is about adaptation. Not so much being the top dog. Not about being the strongest.

Some species adapted themselves into extinction. Others did not. The inability of a species to predict whether past conditions that it has adapted to will be useful in the future. That is limiting.

We may be headed for a dead end.

Does a species always, if they have read Darwin, believe that they are living out a successful adaptation? Obviously we do. Despite evidence to the contrary.

Would Franklin see himself as the superior endpoint of an evolution in dogdom?

There are many thought problems that arise from Darwin's work.

Some of them give me a headache.

This is why people want to suppress Darwin's work. They don't like the results that come from even a minimum of thought. Perhaps they have evolved into the no-thinking line of our species. A reversion.

Darwin has had a huge impact on us. And still does. Like Einstein and Freud. He turns our thinking upside down.

Labels: heroes, science

SOMEONE DIED BUT I FORGET WHO IT WAS

I have always been fascinated with amnesiacs. Stories about them. I never met one. At least I don't remember meeting one.

Read this. It is fascinating.

H. M., an Unforgettable Amnesiac, Dies at 82

Talk about your staying in the moment!

Labels: science