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Plight Of The Postdoc
by Is modern American science strangling its young talents in the cradle?
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Bucky
by Richard Buckminster Fuller was a dreamer. No doubt about it. He had all sorts of ideas about how technology could be employed to solve the ills of our society and species. Most of them never saw the light of day, although his name lives on in a number of areas. There's an excellent opportunity to learn more about him by visiting an excellent new retrospective on him that is in New York's Whitney Museum, and there's a New Yorker article that you can read online.
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Journey To South Africa!
Esteemed wildlife photographer and biologist, Nicolas Devos, is back in South Africa... and he's bringing Correlations readers on the adventure!
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Dwell Wrap Up
by So I made my way to the Dwell On Design Exhibition this past weekend and snapped a few photos for those of you who missed it.
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Dwell On Design Winner
Today is exhibition day at the Dwell On Design Conference and a lucky Correlations reader is heading there with a couple of free tickets in his pocket.
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Let's Dwell On Design
The Dwell On Design Conference begins tomorrow here in (not so) sunny Los Angeles and it looks to be a fantastic few days of talks, house tours, and exhibitions. Oh, and did I mention that I managed to get my hot little hands on a FREE PASS to the event for a lucky Correlations reader?
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Stephen Colbert bows to our microbe overlords
by Finally, someone acknowledges the superiority of microbial life...
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With Honors. Without Options?
In the 21st century, we're producing more Ph.D. graduates than ever while the traditional academic trajectory affords fewer and fewer options.
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The Art Of Science
Sure, Carl Zimmer's got his Science Tattoo Emporium, but I suspect I've just witnessed the creation of the coolest science tattoo this millennium...
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Super-Genius, Hard Work, and Science
Ziya's been discussing some of the celebrated "super-genius" types who are regarded as thinking about deep problems about the universe on behalf of the rest of us. Yes, we should celebrate these people, and I'm very pleased to see Ziya's posts highlighting that sort of work, but I'm a bit worried...
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No, Not A Doomsday Device
When the LHC in Geneva switches on later this year, is the earth going to be destroyed? Fear not - The odds are hugely in our favour.
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Darwin Online!
Want to have a place where you can find all things Darwin? Notebooks, diaries, books, even recipes - to download and to view? Well, the Darwin Online Collection is the place you've been waiting for. Share it with your friends and your students!
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Book Awards - Summer Reading
What are you reading this Summer? Time to start planning. The LA Times Book Festival is this weekend. Maybe their lists of notable books, prepared for their awards ceremony, might give lots of ideas. We can start with the Science and Technology category, but don't stop there...
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A Bright Future
Saturday night I attended North Carolina's 'Celebration of Science, Mathematics, and Technology Education.' If the ceremony reflects the future for math and science, there is certainly reason for hope in tomorrow's leaders.
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Science Policy Forum
"Science and the Candidates" will appear in tomorrow's April 11th issue of the journal Science laying out out how ScienceDebate2008 began, its implications, and where it's going.
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The Psychology of an April Fool
Today is the day to make people (temporarily) believe in something they shouldn’t. Okay, maybe that's better stated as: today is the day to remind people that they should know better. April Fool’s Day tests our skepticism, our self-perception, and (often) our patience. Maybe that’s not such a bad thing.
Faith in Evolution?
'BC Tours' runs alternative tours of science museums and zoos for interested children and their parents. A private company involved in science education? Sounds so WIRED Science, right? Wrong. BC stands for "biblically correct" and their alternative is the denial of the evidence of evolution. Why should we care what some creationists have to say about science? A recent Gallup poll found that 66% of Americans believe Creationism is "probably or definitely true." Sweet cheeses! What century is this?
Go Dark Tonight For Earth Hour 2008
Tonight at 8:00 pm, millions of people around the globe will be turning off their lights... Why?
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Science Fiction Friday: Harlan Ellison and the Lies That Are a Life
February found itself without a Science Fiction Friday interview, but – fear not – I’ve an entertaining behind-the-scenes SFF story for you in this March installment. The last time we checked in Paolo Bacigalupi was opining on a possible future shaped by environmental irresponsibility and regaling me with a story about being tracked down by Harlan Ellison. The thought of the former becoming my reality seemed credible. The thought of the latter happening to me seemed a flight of my imagination. A flight of my imagination, that was, until my imagination crashed into the reality of Harlan tracking me down.
Fetal Teddy Bears & Dream Anatomy
by Ever wondered where teddy bears come from? Ok, to be honest, neither had I. But felt artist Stephanie Metz has certainly given some thought to the development of animals in the womb. In her Genus Ursulus project she examines the anatomy of the imaginary
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Science And Society
Last week, Inoculated Mind's Karl J. Mogel interviewed me about ScienceDebate2008, the role of science in policy, science blogging, and the ever charismatic sea cucumber.
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Sad News
Legendary science fiction author and luminary Sir Arthur C. Clarke has died at age 90. The impact his work had on me personally certainly affords the motivation to use the word 'hero' when describing him, but it's his impact on society broadly that demands the use of heroic modifiers when remembering the man.
Beer As A Science
It's St. Patrick's Day and what better way to celebrate than to explore the science behind your favorite brew!
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Relativistic Art
It's time for some art. Featured here is Tamsin Van Essen, who works in ceramics on a variety of themes. Here, I point to some of her work that has a spacetime theme or two.
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Science and the Presidency
Tomorrow (March 4) is yet another super Tuesday in a line of Super Tuesdays. Why so super? Not just because it's my sister's birthday -- Happy Birthday Jacqui!), but also because people in Texas, Ohio, Vermont, and Rhode Island get to voice their opinions about who will get to spend millions of dollars to run fo the Presidency. Yay, America!
Target Practice
So the other day the Pentagon made the decision to shoot down an ailing spy satellite. Why exactly would they go through all the trouble of firing a missile (that costs millions of dollars) at what amounted to a school bus-sized piece of space junk? And what does it have to do with DIY month? Answers and conspiracy theories abound after the jump.
DIY that turns into DII
Some of the most pleasing forms of DIY are the simplest. When the DIY turns to DII, it's a good old-fashioned win-win situation.
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Finding DIY Solace in iPod Battery Replacement
by It's Spotlight on DIY month here at WIRED SCIENCE Digital, so I thought I would revisit one of my first attempts at taking something apart and fixing it up. Over a year ago, the hacking bug bit me. Though I spent 4 years at MIT among some of the best hackers in the world, I never got the urge to take anything apart in an effort to make an improvement, make it cool, or just to see what was under the hood. I admired my hacker friends at school, and often took advantage of their concoctions (my favorite being the homemade DDR system in our lounge). In a sense, the hacking bug finally caught up to me out of necessity: due to my music obsession I needed an operational iPod without having to shell out a couple hundred dollars for a new one.
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Bleed Blue, Live Green
If you watched the Duke basketball game last Thursday night, you probably noticed our normally blue Cameron Crazies sporting bright GREEN T-shirts... Why?
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Space Exploration's Beginning In the USA
Today is the 50th anniversary of the day the US replied to the world-changing Sputnik launch by the USSR almost four months earlier. In some sense, the space race began in earnest with this launch of the craft called Explorer. It also marked the beginning of spacecraft-driven scientific discoveries about the world beyond and our own planet earth.
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Did you double-dip that chip!?
The science of Seinfeld: does double-dipping a chip really contaminate the chip dip?
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Science Fiction Friday: Paolo Bacigalupi Part III
In this final installment of my conversation with Paolo Bacigalupi, I find out some of the methods and motivations behind the author's stories in his new book PUMP SIX. Whether it's over-consumptive Southern Californians sucking the Western water supply dry, or neo-feudalists bioengineering their impoverished subjects into living musical instruments like a next-generation "American Idol", Paolo manages to fashion truly terrifying and dystopic landscapes into strangely credible visions of our future.
Science Fiction Friday: Paolo Bacigalupi - Part II
In this, the second installment of my conversation with Paolo Bacigalupi, we turn to the substance of his stories and the origins of his various muses. Paolo discusses his environmentalist tendencies, why it's good to believe in the project of science fiction, and why it's not always so good to believe in our technology.
Planck Meets Fleming
So yesterday at Pinewood Studios they announced the name of the upcoming second James Bond film in the new series that (excellently, in my opinion) re-envisions the Bond movie universe. Last year's first one was "Casino Royale", you may recall. Did you hear what the next one will be called?
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Science Fiction Friday: Paolo Bacigalupi
In the last episode of Science Fiction Friday I had a conversation with one of science fiction's elite in Greg Bear and learned how we might all die from bioterrorism. This time around I've turned to SF's new guard in Paolo Bacigalupi and received an education about how we might all die from environmental disaster.
Obesity and Greenhouse Gas Addiction
by Andrew Dessler makes an analogy between weight problems and greenhouse gas emissions, suggesting that greenhouse gases are to society as overeating is to individuals. As a fat person obsessed with climate change, the analogy has not escaped me.
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Coming Attraction
In a world where people read science fiction... That's right, Science Fiction Friday is just two days away and I'm already getting all anxious about it. You too? I've got just the thing for that anxiety: a little preview of what SFF has on offer this week. Paolo Bacigalupi is a sharp and distinctive new voice in science fiction who has a lot to say about our world and where it might be headed.
Framing Science At The NC Science Blogging Conference
I spent Saturday at the NC Science Blogging Conference... but don't let the title fool you. Science bloggers, writers, and journalists from around the world converged in Raleigh, North Carolina to talk about opportunities in new media, our role, and the changing environment.
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The Political Climate
Last night CBS aired the news special "The Age of Warming." Scott Pelley, the "60 Minutes" correspondent did a very "60 Minutes"-like job reporting on the climate science. After the requisite standing at the feet of some receding glaciers, it was off to see some penguins so we could shudder at the thought that they might not have anywhere to march. While it was encouraging to see some mainstream media reportage on science, it wasn't until the investigation turned to the Bush administration's censorship of one of the world's leading climate scientists that I decided that the program warranted a mention here. The revelations are astounding.
Science is Art.
The arts have a monumental role in culture which is, of course, at the intersection of politics, science... Life. They have always been so intricately connected, they are fundamentally aspects of the same entity. Scientists like Nicolas Devos remind me to look closer at our world now and then.
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Diagnosing disease--hundreds of years later
Epidemiologists investigate more than just disease in the present day. Biologic samples allow us a form of time travel, diagnosing diseases that killed their victim hundreds of years ago, and symptoms of disease allow us to speculate even on what ailed fictional characters.
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Reflections: XX and science
As the year draws to a close, Clifford reflects on top science stories. What were some highlights of 2007 when it comes to women in science?
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Reflection
It's time to do that other thing that people do at this time of year: Reflect upon the year that is coming to an end. People start doing highlight programs on the radio and tv, surveying the year of blog posts on blogs, and so forth. Also, various science editors start doing their lists of "top science stories" of the year. What does it all mean? What stories caught your eye?
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Happy New Year. Sort Of.
Many of us will spend the fleeting moments of 2007 toasting something that arguably rivals an odometer ticking over to a round number. Completely arbitrary. For even if space and time do exist, who's counting and to what end?
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Film, Rockets & New Years Eve
Today there are seemingly endless countdown clocks, all ticking off time toward disparate events. There's the countdown to the 2010 Olympics, the countdown to George Bush's days left in office, the countdown to Keanu Reeves' birthday, and even Life countdown clocks if you want a reminder of how many hours you have left before the proverbial bell tolls. So since tomorrow signals the world's largest en masse countdown, I've been wondering just when this idea of a public countdown began?
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Essence
Both Science and Art are part of our everyday culture. Or at least they should be. Do you think of them as related, sharing some common goals, or quite different? Do you go to one as relief from the other, or for inspiration for the other? It is interesting to explore some common themes in art and science.
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Greg Bear Interview Part 3: Analogy Collisions
Science Fiction Friday has finally cooled its jet and settled into orbit around this holiday weekend. So comes to an end Mission: Ursa Major. In this third and final installment of my conversation with Greg Bear, we talk about: predicting the future, law enforcement as an immune response, and the kinds of complications - both real and fictional - science can create.
Greg Bear Interview Part 2: The Bullet You Don't Hear
Science Fiction Friday is so big this week that it can't be contained by just one day. As SFF expands beyond the day of Venus and into the weekend, Greg Bear opens up about his writing process, the longstanding tradition of science fiction writers consulting with the government, and how we better learn how to dodge the bullets we won't hear.
Science Fiction Friday: Greg Bear
Welcome to the very first installment of Science Fiction Friday! I am thrilled that we have one of the great SF writers of his generation, Greg Bear, for our conversation today. I've admired Greg's work for years and now, after having chatted with him, I can say that he's as interesting to talk to as he is to read.
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Science Fiction Friday Draws Nigh!
Hi everybody. I have a fun announcement. I am instituting a new, recurring feature on my blog. It's called Science Fiction Friday. On the third Friday of the month I will interview a different writer about his or her current work. The inaugural installment will be a chat with science fiction legend GREG BEAR!!! He's an author, illustrator, government advisor, and so much more. Dare I call him a polymath? I dare, I dare.
Free To Be M.I.T.
Want to learn about statistical methods in the brain sciences? How about brush up on your single variable calculus? Well, you can do all of this and more without ever getting out of your pajamas. Sound too good to be true? How about if I throw in a bunch of M.I.T. professors to teach it all to you. . . for free!?!
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Sign of the Times
The Society of the German Language has chosen its word of the year. While there were numerous consonant-rich options, I think their choice (along with some other recent news) is reason for optimism. And the winner is. . .
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The Morning After
So last night WIRED Science had its wrap party and, from what I'm told, I was in attendance. You see, the night is a little fuzzy in my memory. To be honest, the world is a little fuzzy today. I am nursing a hangover that I could sell to science. It's got me thinking - what exactly is a hangover?
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Science is Life.
How do we pursue a collective push for improving the state of things? As a nation, there are some major decisions to be thinking about over the coming year and right now is the greatest opportunity to emphasize our national priorities while everyone is paying attention.
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Opting In
So in the last entry I began a discussion of just how much more energy those of us living in the industrialized world use to eat what we want to eat, buy whatever we want to buy, live where we want to live, and go where we want to go. Considering the strain this lifestyle puts on global resources it seems it could better be described as eating too much, buying too often, living where we shouldn't, and just generally going too far.
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How to Say When
So I'm back from an extended Thanksgiving holiday and I've been thinking about overconsuming. The percentage of my wardrobe that I can wear without feeling as though it's an act of mortification seems to be decreasing at alarming rate, but that's just the beginning.
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Art, Butchers & Science
Related to last week's segment on Body Builders, I've been quite interested in following the "issue of tissues" as seen through the lens of contemporary BioArt. Shawn Baily and Jennifer Willet, are artists from my old home town of Montreal, who've formed a research project called Bioteknica.
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On the Retention of Women in Science
We know women in academia make less than our male counterparts, are promoted more slowly, and hold fewer leadership positions. So what's the big deal about examining gender bias? Well, yesterday's Boston Globe Op-Ed by Cathy Young suggests there could be trouble past all the inquiry.
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Rediscovery
Humans are born naturally curious creatures. As youngsters, our world is mainly governed by what's within reach - or even better - fits in our mouths. For most of us, that changes as bigger folks start telling us to stop playing in the mud, eating crayons, and picking up beetles. But I've yet to encounter a first grader who's not fascinated by science - just not necessarily aware of it. Bring up dinosaurs around most six year olds and they'll be captivated in moments. 'You mean ginormous ancestors of birds lived here? REALLY?!' Heck, two decades later, even I'm still mesmerized!
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It's Nobel Week!
It's that time of year everyone! Every year there's a period of about a week during which all the Nobel prizes in the various categories are announced. This is the week. Rather than wait for the press to announce, you can keep an eye on the Nobel site here, and find out who won, what for, and get as much detail as you like about the significance of the contribution the prize is for, and details about the people who won it.
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Deep Impact: Sputnik
Today is the 50th Anniversary of the USSR's launch of the satellite Sputnik. The impact of this event on our culture should not be underestimated. America was scared, shocked, and panicked. The full meaning of the event was not clear to everyone, but the idea that "the Soviets were ahead" did not sit well, and it spurred a huge investment in science and technology - including recognizing the importance of better science education in schools. It must have been an amazing time. The culture was changed forever.
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