The Problem of Pretension. « The Internet Food Association Is it pretentious to insist on fresh food for school lunches? (tags: food politics class-war) the physics arXiv blog » Blog Archive » Calculating the cost of dirty bombs Basically the same analysis that’s in "Physics for Future Presidents," with some added financial figures. Bottom line: […]
Month: February 2009
Photons Are Particles
Over at Dot Physics, Rhett is taking another whack at photons. If you recall, the last time he did this wasn’t too successful, and this round fares no better: So back to the photon. In my original post I made the claim that the photoelectric effect is not a great experiment to show photons. Maybe […]
The Down Side of President Obama
Now that we have a President who is smart, articulate, and has the best interests of the country in mind, I feel compelled to actually watch his major speeches, like last night’s not-really-the-State-of-the-Union address. It’s a small price to pay for having a President who speaks to the nation as if we were rational adults, […]
links for 2009-02-25
slacktivist: Saving newspapers "I’m glad at least though that Time and Isaacson are trying to deal with the question of newspapers’ survival. That’s more than I can say for many of the newspapers themselves. Take for example my employer, the largest newspaper chain in the country. They own dozens of newspapers, small and large, which […]
Award-Winning Science Writing
The winners of the American Physical Society’s Science Writing Awards for 2008 were announced today: Ann Finkbeiner won in the Journalist category for The Jasons, her book about a secretive groups of scientists who work on classified problems for the US government. Gino Segre won in the Scientist category, for Faust in Copenhagen, about the […]
Academic Poll Results: Exam Reporting
the results from yesterday’s poll on reporting exam scores were pretty strongly divided. 47% favored giving histograms, or some very detailed breakdown, while 33% were in favor of statistical measures only (mean, standard deviation, extrema, that sort of thing). 19% were in favor of giving no collective information at all. My own usual practice is […]
Academic Poll Results: Formula Sheets
Tallying up the results of yesterday’s poll about formula sheets (as of 8:00 Tuesday morning, 39 total comments), people were overwhelmingly in favor of formula sheets. 72% of respondents reported being allowed to use formula sheets as students, and 69% were in favor of allowing formula sheets as faculty. A substantial number of the “no” […]
links for 2009-02-24
editors / 23 / 02 / 2009 / Views / Home – Inside Higher Ed Inside Higher Ed has done a comprehensive redesign of the site, including a bunch of new features. The best online academic journal just got better. (tags: academia computing internet) The Reality-Based Community: Annals of sexist oppression "In the middle of […]
Good Writing Needs Editing
Inspired by Leigh Butler at tor.com, I’ve been re-reading Robert Jordan’s Wheel of Time books. This happened to coincide with my recent vicious cold, which is good, because they’re great sickbed reading. Most of my re-reading has been done on my Palm, which miraculously came loaded with electronic copies of all the books. These are […]
Academic Poll: Exam Reporting
No, this isn’t a mistake– I’m doing two quasi-polls on academic issues today, because I care what you think… I’m handing back last Thursday’s exams today. The scores on the test were about what I expect, given the material. As I’m looking at the scores, trying to assess the class as a whole, I’m curious […]