You are currently browsing the category archive for the 'Science' category.
I’ve decided that I really like being back in a research group. Especially as a visiting professor – no classes to teach, no committee work, no advising. Just regular lab work. In other words, fun! So what, exactly am I doing here, and what is the group like? I’m sure that’s exactly what you’re all wondering. If you aren’t, too bad, because that’s what this sabbatical post will be about. If you want to know about something else, leave it in the comments and I’ll write about that sometime.
On July 9, the Pew Research Center released the results of a survey conducted in conjunction with the American Association for the Advancement of Science on how scientists and citizens currently view science in the U.S. The survey of over 2000 non-scientists and over 2000 scientists shows what you might expect – there are some areas where citizens and scientists agree, and some where there are differences of opinions. The survey also includes a “Science Quiz” (follow the link to take the quiz) that was used to gauge non-scientists science knowledge.
I’m not going to try and analyze the results, since that’s been done (duh!), but if you’re interested in knowing what parts I thought were most interesting, look below the fold. If not, at least go take the quiz. I feel good that I scored in the 90th percentile (whew, guess I get to keep my “science badge”).
This is probably only really interesting to me. So here it is anyway. One of the fun things about being a scientist is trying to find out who you are related to. At some point, you’re probably related to someone famous.
My scientific father (Ph.D. advisor) was Charlie Parmenter, at Indiana University. Charlie’s research interests while I was in the group were in studying molecular interactions and energy flow using molecular beams and single vibronic level spectroscopy.
My scientific grandfather was Charlie’s Ph.D. advisor – W.A. Noyes, Jr. at the University of Rochester. Noyes was known as the “father of modern photochemistry”.
That means my scientific grandfather was Henry Le Chatlier, famous in Gen Chem for “Le Chatelier’s Principle. So, there you go!
I should also say that my biological father was a chemist, as was my maternal grandfather. Guess it’s in the blood.!
Please read “Physics is Beauty“, by Lindsay LeBlanc. I think this is how most scientists feel (certainly it is how I feel):
Physics is worth knowing because it is beautiful. It is the hidden secret of the scientist. We may claim to be researching some topic or other because it is “useful to society” or it will revolutionize some technology but, more often than not, we are simply fascinated by some small detail about how the world works and we can’t stop thinking about it until we understand it better. We are constantly astounded by the way a few basic principles work together to explain so many different things, and sit in wonder and awe at the beauty of the world. Like an artist, I want to share this beauty with others. I want them to know what it is to see through my eyes.
Richard Feynman on science:
9,000-Year-Old Brew Hitting Shelves This Summer
This summer, how would you like to lean back in your lawn chair and toss back a brew made from what may be the world’s oldest recipe for beer? Called Chateau Jiahu, this blend of rice, honey and fruit was intoxicating Chinese villagers 9,000 years ago—long before grape wine had its start in Mesopotamia.
New Laser Facility Fuels Dreams of Nuclear Fusion
Talk of the Nation, June 5, 2009 · A new multibillion-dollar facility in California houses the world’s most powerful laser. But is it powerful enough to trigger the thermonuclear fusion reaction that occurs in stars? Some scientists are doubtful. Lab Director Edward Moses discusses the controversial project.
Theodore Gray (of periodictable.com) has a nice post on the Powell’s Books.Blog, Is Science as Important as Football?. A sample:
We have turned science, which should be the most exciting, the most engaging, the most relevant hour of the school day, into a deathly boring series of lectures and video games. Is it any wonder kids would rather become accountants, when chartered accountancy is made to seem like a more exciting profession than science?
The inevitable result is the well-documented decline in students entering universities to study science. But even worse is the equally well-documented decline in the understanding and appreciation of science by the general public.
I just used Wordle to see what my PChem course is about this semester. To create the image (courtesy of Wordle – http://www.wordle.net) I just pasted the text from my syllabus, and got this:
Here’s what I got for the blog:
I’m thinking about using the text from all the syllabi in our department to see what we actually teach here. Maybe we could use it in our assessment materials.
Practical? Probably not. Cool? Definitely. A group in Hamburg (one of my old haunts) is working on research that could be used to send photons through walls. Or the Earth. How cool is that?
IF YOU shine a laser on the floor, where does the light go? With the right preparation, some of it might pop out at the other side of the world – an effect that could be exploited to transmit secret messages through the ground.
If I was an undergrad, I’d have loved to go to Germany (especially Hamburg) to shine lasers at walls and stuff. Basically, if this works, it would be nearly impossible to intercept messages. Of course, it isn’t quite ready for iTunes:
Malcolm Fairbairn, a physicist at King’s College London, points out that over the 12,700-kilometre diameter of the Earth, the signal capacity would be just 1 bit per second: “At that speed it would take about a year to download an mp3 file, so I’m not sure who would use it.”
I’m using Carl Sagan’s Demon Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark as a text in my Freshman inquiry seminar. I just ran across a quote in it, from John Passmore, about how science is presented:
as a matter of learning principles and applying them by routine procedures. It is learned from textbooks, not by reading the works of great scientists or even the day-to-day contributions to the scientific literature… the beginning scientist, unlike the beginning humanist, does not have an immediate contact with genius. Indeed… school courses can attract quite the wrong sort of person into science – unimaginative boys and girls who like routine.
This is a really wonderful quote. I tend to agree – science courses are too content driven, and not “doing science” driven. I would love to be able to escape from the dogma of textbooks, and get more into doing science, which of course would require learning the content as we go. Anyone with me?
Recent Comments