... emphasize and invest in science, rather than pull away from it. "Science is one of the jewels in our crown but it yields its dividends over decades." (I believe that the US National Academy of Sciences
Posted by Andrew Jaffe: Leaves on the Line
... of its top 30 best science blogs. It's always nice to get some recognition, even if it doesn't come with a wheelbarrow full of money and a free trip to Tahiti. You listening, Times Online? Just a suggestion. Anyway, I
Posted by Bad Astronomy
The Dutch science research council NWO has set up a 2. 5 million euro fund (Dutch) to encourage its scientists to publish their work in open access journals. Under the scheme, any NWO grant holder can apply (English) for up to 5000 euro per project to pay open access publication charges. The incentive programme, which went
Posted by SarahAskew
When we think about the “meaning of life,” we tend to conjure ideas such as love, or self-actualization, or justice, or human progress. It's an anthropocentric view; try to convince blue-green algae that self-actualization is some sort of virtue. Let's ask instead why “life,” as a biological concept, actually exists. That is
Posted by Cosmic Variance
The website called Today I Found Out has an interesting post on Sun factoids, including its color as designated in hex code: #FFF5F2. That code is actually taken from the site vendian. org, put together by Mitchell Charity. He has other star colors listed as well. I found the codes for different stellar types interesting. The star
Posted by Bad Astronomy
Representing what may be the first long term lunar environmental impact study, recent laser ranging data from the Apache Point Observatory in New Mexico suggests theLunar Ranging Retro Reflectors (LRRRs) left on the Moon by Apollo missions 11, 14 and 15 are beginning to shows signs of age.(...)Read the rest of It´s Not Just The
Posted by Universe Today
... right, a real, not-science-fiction-honest-to-goodness jetpack. New Zealander Glenn Martin has been working on perfecting his jetpack for 30 years, and in 1998 created the Martin Aircraft Company to develop and market his idea. Now, the jetpack has become a
Posted by Universe Today
Way to stay classy, South Australian Labor Party. In a election advertisement I saw last night the Labor Party is wittering on about how it is tough on drug crime (with a picture that says 100 dead from ecstasy in the back ground - more about this figure later). It then cuts to the Opposition Liberal leader, Elizabeth Isoble Redmond, saying "Ecstasy is not as bad as some other drugs" and then the add voice-over says. "Not Bad Ms Redmond?" with the clear implication ecstasy is really, really bad
Posted by Astroblog
In my Bio II class, we're working our way through the various classifications of life. We started off with the prokaryotes. They were all right. Talking about all the nasty ways viruses and bacteria can destroy you was great fun for the students. Next up is "protists". And I gotta ask... What the hell were you guys thinking on the classification on this one?!The definition is a pure anti-definition: It's everything eukaryotic except plants, animal, and fungi. That only leaves (according to one sou
Posted by Angry Astronomer
... about peer-reviewed science, you should go sign up – immediately, if not sooner. There are some great blogs
Posted by SarahAskew
Up on a hill, as the day dissolvesWith my pencil turning moments into lineHigh above in the violet skyA silent silver plane – it draws a golden chainOne by one, all the stars appearAs the great winds of the planet spiral inSpinning away, like the night sky at ArlesIn the million insect storm, the constellations
Posted by Galaxy Zoo Blog
Starting tonight on the BBC, a new series premiers called "Wonders of the Solar System". The host is some guy named Brian Cox. He's a particle physicist! I don't see the BBC hiring me to do a show on the Large Hadron Collider, so this doesn't seem fair. And I'm a little concerned about how
Posted by Bad Astronomy
... about spaceflight than science but still a very fun list that will easily consume your afternoon if you let it. Click at your own risk.
Posted by Angry Astronomer
... is the language of science (especially physics and astronomy) and how pseudo-scientist supporters visiting his site often ask him to town down the math to a simpler level. This very strongly reflects on just how intellectually sophisticated these people are as are their leaders (who Tom has repeatedly requested mathematical and numerical predictions from instead of post-hoc "my theory predicted that" claims). He
Posted by Angry Astronomer
Thanks in no small part to my beloved BABloggees and Tweeps, Rachael Dunlop won a Shorty Award in the Health category!Yay!It's nice that she gets some recognition for her debunking of quackery, hoaxery, and quite a bit of alt-meddery, but the real schadenfreudeliciousness comes from knowing that she's helping Mike Adams' and Joe Mercola's heads
Posted by Bad Astronomy
Short on fuel, but good at astrophysics? It is possible to tour the solar system on less than 30 Altairian dollars a day by using the Interplanetary Transport Network (ITN).(...)Read the rest of Astronomy Without A Telescope The Hitchhikers Guide To The Solar System (571 words)© Steve Nerlich for Universe Today, 2010. |Permalink |No
Posted by Universe Today
... A stroll anywhere on the island is a lesson in geology for an observant hiker. Much of the Big Island is a raw land where the bones of the earth show through. Lava flows, pu'us, craters, and the massive volcanoes dominate the landscape. On the older areas of the island erosion and soil formation softens the raw rock. Where there has been enough rainfall and time, deep canyons cut deep into the island, again exposing the geologic history of the land to view. Learning to look at the la
Posted by A Darker View
Artwork Credit: NASA / Don DavisI like space. I like dinosaurs. I own a very well-written book called "T. rex and the Crater of Doom". So you'd think I would be happy about a news story titled "It's official: An asteroid wiped out the dinosaurs". But I'm not; in fact, I'm quite grumpy about it. Why? Because many of the versions of this story that I've read, whether from internet news, traditional media, or even Scientific American, imply that this is a decisio
Posted by Professor Astronomy's Astronomy Blog
Speaking of the long-awaited Hubble observations of Hanny's Voorwerp – where are they? We know certain windows when each can be done, and is supposed to be carried out. One such week-long window has already gone by without getting data, so things are narrowed down a bit. The next possibility is a set of near-infrared
Posted by Galaxy Zoo Blog
... am pleased to write that the creationist and generally anti-reality Don McLeroy has lost his bid for re-election to the Texas State Board of Education!Yay!The man who ousted him is Thomas Ratliff, who is — gasp! — an actual educator who has vowed to try to remove the politicization of the board and also
Posted by Bad Astronomy
... character from bad science fiction than an actual member of the Government) has announced "new arrangements" for STFC (press-release version here or here) . Basically, the government will try to insulate grant funding from two big sources of un
Posted by Andrew Jaffe: Leaves on the Line
We have some new results to show off, Hanny's Voorwerp observed using a space telescope. No, not that space telescope, that's still coming up (shortly, we hope). Soon after the initial results showed what a fascinating object Hanny'sVoorwerp was proving to be, it was entered in the observing schedule for NASA'S GALEX satellite (GALaxy Evolution EXplorer).
Posted by Galaxy Zoo Blog
Note: Giulio Magli was one of the examiners of my thesis, so his book is hardly likely to get a bad review. This review rounds off a trilogy to go with Skywatchers, Shamans and Kings and People and the Sky. Like the other two books this could be said to be part of a World Archaeoastronomy
Posted by AlunSalt: Ancient Science and the Science of Ancient Things
... things'll change for science on TV. Maybe sometime soon.
Posted by Bad Astronomy
Three iPhone apps recently came out that pertain to some favorite topics on this blog, so here's a quick roundup of them. 1) John Cook, like me, got tired of hearing the same old long-debunked claims from global warming deniers being used over and over again, so he created an app debunking these claims. Called Skeptical
Posted by Bad Astronomy
... had a slight worry earlier today. I have an idea that I think has cross-over relevance between SETI and Ancient History about ancient speculations on extraterrestrial life. I was slightly alarmed when I read Jean Schneider's new pre-print on arXiv, The Extraterrestrial Life debate in different cultures. In it Schneider argues that arguments about
Posted by AlunSalt: Ancient Science and the Science of Ancient Things
Image Credit: USGS Real-Time Seismogram DisplaysSaturday morning, I awoke to news of the magnitude 8. 8 earthquake that occurred 200 miles southwest of Santiago, Chile. That news snapped me awoke instantly. Magnitude 8. 8 is a monstrous earthquake, roughly 500 times the strength of last month's disastrous quake in Haiti. The amount of energy released in the Chilean quake is roughly equal to the amount of sunlight that hits the Earth in a three tenths of a second, or roughly one h
Posted by Professor Astronomy's Astronomy Blog
... done it. Unfortunately, science keeps coming along and showing that our egos are misplaced. We're special, but not magically so. We evolved big brains capable of deep thought, but it shares a common ancestor with all life. Even our planet is a pale blue dot in a vast and inspiring universe. But Creationists constantly try to claim that this solitary orb is so amazingl
Posted by Angry Astronomer
This is totally cool: an animated simulator that lets you make model solar systems! It's put together by the PhET Interactive Simulations group at — hey! — the University of Colorado at Boulder. All you have to do is put in the masses, locations, and initial velocities of the objects (up to four) and then hit
Posted by Bad Astronomy
Just over a week ago Sidney Perkowitz suggested that film-makers should limit themselves to one big scientific flaw in a film. All sorts of critics have had fun with this. writerJames has posted an interesting response arguing scientific accuracy can enhance a story. I'm going to go a bit further and argue that the one
Posted by AlunSalt: Ancient Science and the Science of Ancient Things
While a huge earthquake off the coast of Chile triggered a tsunami that moved at the speed of a jet aircraft across the Pacific Ocean on Feb. 27, the event thankfully — was smaller than scientists expected. Some experts forecasted the event would produce 9-foot tall tsunami waves slamming coastlines along the Pacific
Posted by Universe Today
... know mentioning Al Gore, let alone linking to him, is like throwing red meat into the pit of denialists, but Gore's Op Ed in today's New York Times is really quite good. I wonder if he reads my blog? He hits a lot of the points I have the past few days… though he
Posted by Bad Astronomy
Then take me disappearin' through the smoke rings of my mindDown the foggy ruins of time…Yes, to dance beneath the diamond sky with one hand waving free,Silhouetted by the sea, circled by the circus sands,With all memory and fate driven deep beneath the waves,Let me forget about today until tomorrow.- Bob Dylan, “Mr Tambourine Man”Afterlast
Posted by Galaxy Zoo Blog
I've been in Geneva now for a couple of days. We spent yesterday visiting CERN, trying to inspire the artists, architects and scientists alike (I've collaborated with people here, but I've never visited before). I'll upload some photos when I get back to faster broadband.(There are some more pictures here.) -->Until then, you can check out Peter Coles' blog for his tall tale of CERN's history. My Imperial and Planck colleague Dave Clements is also participating -- and blogging. The second night,
Posted by Andrew Jaffe: Leaves on the Line
You'll see me put up more TED videos over the next few months. I've had one in the drafts folder since Christmas, but I need some photos to go with it, and haven't had the chance to get them. The prod is that I've applied for a TED fellowship. I don't have a realistic chance
Posted by AlunSalt: Ancient Science and the Science of Ancient Things
On February 14th, Planck completed its first survey of the whole sky. But there was no rest – it immediately started on its second all-sky survey. The nominal Planck mission is for two all sky surveys, with the second survey completed in 6 months from now. However, the satellite is using cryogens sufficiently sparingly that it's
Posted by Blogging the Planck Mission
The web is abuzz about an interview antivax activist and public health threat Jenny McCarthy did with Time magazine. A lot of folks seem to think that McCarthy is backtracking on her claims that vaccines cause autism. Let me be very clear: that simply isn't true. McCarthy is still making the same debunked, discredited, and dangerous
Posted by Bad Astronomy
Last night at 06:34 UTC, a huge earthquake struck on the coast of Chile, with a reported magnitude of a numbing 8. 8 on the Richter scale — making it one of the largest earthquakes recorded on Earth since 1900. A tsunami warning has been issued for the entire Pacific ocean. This is no joke; the tsunami
Posted by Bad Astronomy
Because I love to write about climate change and watch the misinformation and noise fly in the comments, I will direct your attention to two very interesting articles about denialism:1) My friend and noted skeptic Steve Novella writes about the meaning of scientific consensus and denialism, whether that's over global warming or vaccines. 2) An article
Posted by Bad Astronomy
As I alluded to in my previous post, last week I spent a rather fabulous week in the Rocky Mountain resort of Aspen. The Aspen Center for Physics hosted a conference, organised by Andrea Ghez, Vicky Kalogera, Fred Rasio, and Steinn Sigurdsson (of the Dynamics of Cats blog), on the Formation and Evolution of Black
Posted by SarahAskew
... talking about what science is and what it does. As Richard Dawkins
Posted by Bad Astronomy
The first few months of the year are traditionally awards season in the film industry, and in the blogging world it's no different. I got back from a well-deserved and fabulous holiday a few days ago to discover I'm shortlisted for a Research Blogging award in the category of Best Research Blog in Chemistry, Astronomy
Posted by SarahAskew
I'm in Geneva for a few days as part of a project called "Beyond Entropy: When Entropy Becomes Form", sponsored by the Architectural Association back in London, the brainchild of Stefano Rabolli Pansera and others at the AA. It brings together eight trios of architects, artists and scientists to produce works to be shown at the Venice Architecture Biennale later this year, and possibly the better-known Art Biennale in 2011. But beyond that broad outline, none of us know much about what we will b
Posted by Andrew Jaffe: Leaves on the Line
... spent last week attending the “Formation and Evolution of Black Holes” conference at the Aspen Center for Physics, organized by Andrea Ghez, Vicky Kalogera, Fred Rasio, and Steinn Sigurdsson (who blogs over at the Dynamics of Cats). It was a great mix of observers and theorists, and we covered the full range, from stellar-mass
Posted by Cosmic Variance
No, not Terra the Earth, Terra the satellite. NASA's Earth-observing bird first opened its eyes on February 24, 2000, and for the past decade has been dutifully watching our planet. It has looked upon us at different wavelengths, different resolutions, at different times of day, and different times of year. It has tracked changes, and
Posted by Bad Astronomy
The Earth is warming up. That's a fact. Denialists will deny (and no doubt will amp up the noise in the comments below) but the truth is the Earth has warmed on average over a degree Fahrenheit in the past century or so, and the past decade, 2000 – 2009, was the warmest on record.
Posted by Bad Astronomy
... just woke up from 12 hours of sleep. Boy was it needed. Naka this year was great. Not the best con I've ever attended, but as with every con, it has its own bits of magic. I'm what we at Naka call a Director. Other cons usually call this a Head of Staff. I'm in charge of setting up the gaming room and managing the staff in there. It's simultaneously one of the easiest jobs and one of the worst. It's easy because there's never a super ton of stuff to do all at once. Most of our equipment is donate
Posted by Angry Astronomer
Some people cannot learn. Thai army chief General Anupong Paojinda is defending the use of what are essentially magic wands to detect bombs, even though the specific device they use has been tested repeatedly and failed to perform. This device is essentially the same as the ones used in Iraq and Afghanistan which have been proven
Posted by Bad Astronomy
... widely used in medical science. SEMs have the power to magnify objects hundreds of times more than regular optical microscopes because they monitor the way electrons react with a surface instead of focusing photons of light through lenses to form an image. below is an image created by chris supranowitz using an SEM. can you guess what the long path is? its the groove in a vinyl record. awesome!in an SEM, an electron be
Posted by astropixie
I've been meaning to link to this post at the arXiv blog, which is a great source of quirky and interesting new papers. In this case they are pointing to a speculative but interesting paper by Martin Perl and Holger Mueller, which suggests an experimental search for gradients in dark energy by way of
Posted by Cosmic Variance
Years ago, I visited the Grand Canyon with my family. The beauty of it was overwhelming, and everything they say about it is true. It's magnificent. That grandeur is only amplified by the obvious scientific significance of it. The layers of sedimentary rock, exposed by the eons-long patient erosion of the Colorado river, are a
Posted by Bad Astronomy
My stance on climate change is clear: the scientific evidence that we're getting warmer is overwhelming, and the most likely cause is that it's human-produced. The first is fact, the second is a conclusion based on a lot of evidence. Climategate showed us that the noise machine is in full swing; nothing in those emails
Posted by Bad Astronomy
“Love is a burning flameAnd it makes a fiery ringBringing hurt to the heart's desireI fell in the ring of fire- Johnny CashBefore I venture any deeper into the mysterious world of Ring Galaxies, I thought I would give a quick introduction tothe archetypal ring galaxy the “Collisional Ring”. Collisional Rings are formed when a smaller
Posted by Galaxy Zoo Blog
... in turn provides a science-based context for answering questions about the possibility of life on ancient Mars. Our understanding of Mars' climate today is neatly packaged as climate models, which in turn provide powerful consistency checks – and sources of inspiration – for
Posted by Universe Today
... was in school for a long time. essentially, i never left, its just that now instead of taking tests, i have to create new knowledge, convince my "peers" that the new information is interesting, and struggle to find jobs every couple of years. as i really began to focus on one field during my phd studies, i realized one particularly fascinating and frustrating fact: the more i learned, the more questions i had! the more knowledge i gained, the more i realized i *didnt* know! and i became a
Posted by astropixie
... met Baba Brinkman at TAM London, and wasn't sure what to make of him. He's a big guy, noticeably white, and raps. About evolution. OK then. Well, being a skeptic I had to wait for the evidence. So when he performed on stage I was attentive, and my scientific curiosity was quickly satisfied: he's the
Posted by Bad Astronomy
Type Ia supernovae are very important exploding stars. It's thought that this particular type of supernova has a very special property: they all explode with about the same energy. This makes them very valuable, because it means that if you can simply measure how bright they appear to be, you can figure out how far
Posted by Bad Astronomy
Today I went to a talk by Chris Rapley, a Professor at UCL and currently director of the Science Museum in London (across the quad from Imperial), "Climate Change: Who Should I Believe?". In a department full of academic scientists (including a few working on the climate, such as our head of department, Professor Jo Haigh) there was a sense of preaching to the converted: we've already evaluated the evidence, or, at least, done our best to evaluate those presenting the evidence -- even scientists
Posted by Andrew Jaffe: Leaves on the Line
Off early this morning, as I have to travel to the frozen North to give a seminar in a foreign land. Time, therefore, to pad this blog thing out with another poem. I haven't posted much by Walt Whitman sonow seems like a good time to correct the omission. This is called Eidolons, and it's
Posted by In The Dark
On the Carribean island of Montserrat is the Soufrière Hills volcano. This is the very same one that erupted in 1997 and did so much damage to the small island (and killed 19 people). On February 11, just a few days ago, the growing lave dome on the volcano partially collapsed, sending a plume 15,000 meters
Posted by Bad Astronomy
... no connection, the science is unequivocable, the antivaxxers are letting emotions take over when they should be looking at the
Posted by Bad Astronomy
... used to make little flipbooks inside my notebooks in school, but this is pretty much the ultimate one! thanks mike!
Posted by astropixie
The long-awaited experiment that will search for dark matter is getting closer to heading to the International Space Station. The Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer (AMS) is undergoing final testing at ESA´s Test Centre in the Netherlands before being launched on the space shuttle to the ISS, currently scheduled for July, 2010. The AMS will
Posted by Universe Today
Hey, nobody told me that having a blog would involve homework. But here's Jerry Coyne, nudging me into talking about a story in this morning's New York Times. Fortunately it's interesting enough to be worth taking a swipe at. The news is an interesting result from RHIC, the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider at Brookhaven
Posted by Cosmic Variance
... exploration of whether or not science can actually address religion (it can) and asks whether the topic should even be bro
Posted by Angry Astronomer
Hmmm, not all VDs are happy: this strip from xkcd is a little bit of a downer, but I have a hard time disagreeing with his message. Hover your mouse over the strip to see what he means. This particular strip reminds me of Robert Sheckley's "The Language of Love". I have to say, I'm
Posted by Bad Astronomy
We've been a little quiet over at Merger Zoo recently. In the first three months of this project, you have viewed nearly two million simulations for nearly 40 different galaxies. Of these two million, you have picked about 30000 galaxies that we have been doing further investigations on. In short, we have been extremely
Posted by Galaxy Zoo Blog
... love the Sixty Symbols videos – and this is a particularly kooky one. I think Valentine's Day is the most pointless of all the pointless contrived holidays – but if I were to celebrate it, this is how I'd do it.
Posted by SarahAskew
About | List of blogs | Leave a comment | Last updated: Sun, 14 Mar 2010 01:08 UTC