Category Archives: Science and Edumacation
Names
An interesting take from Patrick Michaels on the contention that NOAA is naming more storms. They clearly are — since average storm intensity has dropped. But it also may be justified since even low intensity storms can cause massive flooding.
Wednesday Night Linkorama
The government used to protect poor people, and young people, and people with bad credit histories, from getting loans, by making it illegal to charge the high interest rates that would make those loans profitable. Were they better off? They didn’t have credit card debt, to be sure, or huge mortgages. Instead they had pawnshops, or time payments, or convictions for kiting checks, all of which used to be popular ways of handling things like emergency car repairs.
Borrowers may have had help getting in over their heads, but at the end of the day, “variable interest rates vary” is not in the realm of things it is unreasonable to expect them to have understood when they signed on for a gigantic mortgage. Indeed, many of the defaulters seem not to be able to afford their teaser rates, which is certainly something they should have been able to figure out on their own. One of the reasons that I do not currently own a home is that I cannot afford one. Now I get to pitch in my tax dollars to bail out people who also could not afford a home, but went ahead and bought one anyway.
Tuesday Afternoon Linkorama
I’d Still Prefer Him to the Wolfman
Cool.
This was a bug you couldn’t swat and definitely couldn’t step on. British scientists have stumbled across a fossilized claw, part of an ancient sea scorpion, that is of such large proportion it would make the entire creature the biggest bug ever.
How big? Bigger than you, and at 8 feet long as big as some Smart cars.
The discovery in 390-million-year-old rocks suggests that spiders, insects, crabs and similar creatures were far larger in the past than previously thought, said Simon Braddy, a University of Bristol paleontologist and one of the study’s three authors.
That’s almost as big as what we have here in Texas.
Why I Fight
I sometimes get asked why I post so often at Right-Thinking about creationism (although once every now and then doesn’t seem very often to me). Am I beating a dead horse?
Perhaps. But I’m passionate about science. I have always loved science, knew I was going to be some kind of scientist and have spent the last 15 years of my life doing science for far less money than I could make in industry. I love to teach science. Seeing the excitement that science creates in people; sharing that sense of wonder; seeing how excited they get when science works and makes sense; this is special.
To me, science is, if you like, the very voice of God. Our attempt to understand the universe in which we live is the great endeavor of our race.
I’m not interested in dissuading people from their religious beliefs. I’m sympathetic to religious views. I’ve repeatedly slammed Hitchens, Dawkins and other idiots on this blog for ignorantly criticizing religion and proclaiming ultimate enlightenment. I read the Bible, have a mezzuzah on my door and light candles on fridays.
Moreover, I understand that in a world gone mad, many people have a need to fall back on the familiar. And nothing is more familiar than the Bible.
I have no problem with people believing in whatever myths they want. What I object to is pretending this is science. What I object to is using the trappings of science to indoctrinate people to what is, at its base, a religious view.
Creationists are classic pseudo-scientists. They know the words, they wear white coats, they spin their fancy theories. But they are not scientists. They ignore evidence they don’t like. They make things up. They misread. And, most importantly, their theories are not falsifiable. Any theory that can not be disproven is, by definition, not scientific (note, this applies to pseudoscientific multiverse and string theories as well).
What really gets my boxers in a bunch, however, is the demonization of science that is illustrated in things like Ben Stein’s ignorant blog post and the Creation Museum. I think religious people are wrong, but I don’t think they are evil — that’s the difference between Hitchens and I. But, for creationists, it’s not not enough that science is wrong, it has to be evil. And not just evil in the ignorant way — but evil in a leftist, atheist, secular humanist cabal attempting to destroy society and make gays marry way.
So yes, I will respond to this poison. And yes, I will ridicule their pseudo-scientific garbage, the same way I ridicule Michael Bay’s pseudo-movie entertainment, Joe Morgan’s pseudo-sports-analysis and the LA Dodgers’ pseudo-managing of a baseball franchise. Ignorance and dogmatism annoy me.
Update: One last thing. The main reason creationism annoys me is that it illustrates the greatest cost in the human experience — opportunity cost. The time that kids spend learning religion-based pseudoscience is time they aren’t spending learning useful things like physics and chemistry.
The Creation Museum is very well done. But just think if all that money, passion and effort had been invested in a planetarium. Or a Museum of Paleontology, Archeology or Anthropology.
IQ and Race
Via Sully, I find this fascinating article on race and IQ. Read both pages, as the second gets into why environment is important.
I’ve been thinking about this subject for some time. Here are some random thoughts.
No matter how you twist the data, someone with a low IQ doesn’t necessarily have it because of genetics. There are a number of environmental factors that have proven connections to IQ and it seems most of them are negative (and far more prevalent among blacks). Malnutrition, illness, neglect, drugs and poor education can all drive IQ down. These are not factors passed on to children — well, at least not in their genes. The Flynn Effect, the sharp rise in western IQs over the last century, is clearly environmental (and larger than the present black-white IQ gap). Evolution doesn’t work that fast.
Moreover, the drive to reproduce and create a new generation is, in my mind, a far more important characteristic than intelligence. What good is having a high IQ if you can’t pass it on? People complain about the fertility-intelligence anti-correlation. I complain about it all the time when I go to social functions and find I am the only scientist who has spawned. But in a way, this is nature telling us something important — high intelligence (as opposed to slightly above average) isn’t a survival characteristic. If it were, high IQ people would have more kids.
Update: RPL points out, quite correctly, that the opportunity cost of having children is higher for high-IQ people. Agreed. But that opportunity cost is lower than it has ever been. And the reason for not having kids that I hear most often has nothing to do with career, but lifestyle.
It would be interesting to compare the career achievement of high-IQ people with kids to those of high-IQ people without. My personal experience is that my work ethic improved after having a kid. Others’ mileage my vary.
Update: One thing I thought I’d ad: IQ can only get you so far. I work in a high-IQ profession and it’s my experience that smartness helps, but had work and perseverance are the deciding factors. Progress in science, especially, is driven more toil than flashes of inspiration. What was it Edison said about invention?
Always remember, Charles Darwin didn’t have a high IQ. And he glimpsed the inner workings of the world — through years and years of hard work.
Thursday Night Linkorama
Programs that focus exclusively on abstinence have not been shown to affect teenager sexual behavior, although they are eligible for tens of mil lions of dollars in federal grants, according to a study released by a nonpartisan group that seeks to reduce teen pregnancies.
…
The study found that while abstinence-only efforts appear to have little positive impact, more comprehensive sex education programs were having “positive outcomes” including teenagers “delaying the initiation of sex, reducing the frequency of sex, reducing the number of sexual partners and increasing condom or contraceptive use.”
“Two-thirds of the 48 comprehensive programs that supported both abstinence and the use of condoms and contraceptives for sexually active teens had positive behavior effect,” said the report.
Abstinence and condoms. Abstinence and condoms! Abstinence AND condoms, you microcephalic Religious Right twerps!
No to Good Schools
It’s really depressing that school vouchers keep losing. But it’s hardly surprising. They are opposed by one of the wealthiest, most powerful, most shameless, most vicious special interests in the country. God forbid we should quit doing what hasn’t worked for the last thirty fucking years.
Vouchers don’t stand much of a chance in referenda, which is why the teacher’s goonions love to put them up for vote. The reason is that the majority of parents either (a) have access to the good public schools; (b) have the money for private schools and don’t want those nasty poor kids getting in; (c) have the money for private schools but support “the system” out of guilt or misguided ideology; or (d) have neither the time nor the money to get educated about the idea and so listen to whatever lies are being poured into their ears.
The only people who lose here are poor people, poor kids, teachers in inner city schools, principals, the United States, the human race and the planet Earth. But at least the teachers unions get their membership and influence, the Democrats get their campaign donations and rich people keep poor kids out of their schools. So who cares if everyone else gets it in the ear?
Me? Next time I give to charity, I’m going to find one that provides scholarships for poor kids.
Monday Linkorama
Longstanding principles of law hold that an American corporation is entitled to rely on assurances of legality from officials responsible for government activities. The public officials in question might be right or wrong about the advisability or legality of what they are doing, but it is their responsibility, not the company’s, to deal with the consequences if they are wrong.
To deny immunity under these circumstances would be extraordinarily unfair to any cooperating carriers. By what principle of justice should anyone face potentially ruinous liability for cooperating with intelligence activities that are authorized by the president and whose legality has been reviewed and approved by our most senior legal officials?
He makes a good case. (Hat Tip: Overlawyered.com, which is rapidly becoming one of my favorite all-purpose blogs.)
Zapping Virii
Cool:
A physicist and his biologist son destroyed a common virus using a superfast pulsing laser, without harming healthy cells. The discovery could lead to new treatments for viruses like HIV that have no cure.
“We have demonstrated a technique of using a laser to excite vibrations on the shield of a virus and damage it, so that it’s no longer functional,” said Kong-Thon Tsen, a professor of physics at Arizona State University. “We’re testing it on HIV and hepatitis right now.”
This is such a good idea, I’ll have to steal it for a short story.
Vouchers
I’ve just discovered Megan McArdle’s excellent blog. Today has a fantastic post on school vouchers, where she takes apart the arguments of the opponents.
My favorite:
5) Vouchers destroy the public school system So? Having a public school system seems like a dumb goal to me, but even assuming that the very existence of such a system is somehow a worthy thing to aim for, surely it’s achievement should be a second-order priority. The primary goal, it seems to me, should be educating America’s children to reach their fullest potential; after that goal has been achieved, we can turn our attention to things like having teacher’s unions and public schools.
Read the whole thing. I’m not completely sold on vouchers since I worry about creeping government control. I would prefer to start with simple school choice. But vouchers would certaintly be an improvement over what we have now.
My Job Prospects
Well, this is depressing:
It’s easy to wish upon a star — but if you want to make a living studying them, things get quite a bit tougher.
Take a look at any astronomy-themed Web site, or tune in to a science television program, and you’re sure to be dazzled by the wonders of the universe. Black holes! Dark matter! Colliding galaxies!
What you won’t hear is what many graduate and post-doctoral students in astronomy today know all too well — permanent, tenure-track jobs in the field are rare.
Last year was a bad year for jobs. I know a number of top-notch people who got precisely zero offers. Not being a top-notch person myself, I didn’t even get short-listed. Were it not for the funds remaining on my HST grant, I would be out of astronomy right now. And I’m convinced that if I don’t land a big NSF grant, my astronomy career will be over by August.
This has been going on for a while — it’s the spooky music that underlies the beautiful images you see from Hubble. Astronomy programs have been graduating way more Ph.D.’s than there are permanent jobs.
I started doing astronomy in 1993 and have enjoyed it immensely. Graduate school was one of the poorest but best times of my life and the people I suffered with are still my best friends. If I leave the profession after 15 years, I won’t regret the time I’ve spent here.
But I do sometimes wish they’d be a little more realistic with incoming graduate students.
Al Gore, Certified Genius
Before he wins the Nobel Prize, you should know that Al Gore’s movie had some big mistakes. Mistakes he has repeated over and over again.