Explore the links: Doc was a "Trekkie," and the embed at the Trekkie link is a speech never quoted in the media. His courage and sacrifice allowed us all to "live long, and prosper." I was a freshman at NC A&T State University when this song dropped:
Something to Brighten Your Day: Nuff said. Grins and giggles, and you might learn some Calculus out of the deal.
Theory: it's a word that's confused with uninvestigated opinion, so politically if one doesn't want to accept the implications of Evolution or Global Warming, "theory" is supposed to disqualify any further discussions.
From Wikipedia:
"Social Darwinism is a term commonly used for theories of society that emerged in England and the United States in the 1870s, seeking to apply the principles of Darwinian evolution to sociology and politics.[1] It especially refers to notions of struggle for existence being used to justify social policies which make no distinction between those able to support themselves and those unable to support themselves. The most prominent form of such views stressed competition between individuals in laissez-faire capitalism but it is also connected to the ideas of eugenics, scientific racism, imperialism,[2] fascism, Nazism and struggle between national or racial groups."
I get that, and chiefly as a member of a group that's been used on, identify with the concern. However, with global warming there will come a point where there's "no turning back" and no starships to Exodus us to the stars.
The Bible has also been twisted to justify slavery as well as a perpetual curse of servitude. Mainstream Mormonism has since repudiated the notion of lighter skin being a sign that you did something right in the pre-existence during the war in heaven, and dark skin, well...we were "neutral"; we did not pick sides, our skin a sign of "the curse" (Mormon eschatology). Before the 2008 presidential elections, a friend forwarded a photo from England of an American riding a Harley. On the back of his T-shirt, this statement: "N----r please! It's the WHITE HOUSE!"
Any dominate group that wants to remain dominant latches on to the most convienient theory that justifies their already set opinions of themselves. It is a pathology that self-esteem is only justified by another groups subjugation and misery.
Pythagoras would have a time today!
Neutrinos are known to exist, but no one at this time knows how much a "neutrino mass" is. They are similar to the electron, yet don't carry an electrical charge (i.e. "neutral").
It's about the Tuskegee Airmen, and Hollywood thinks it's not "green" enough, meaning...well, see what George Lucas has to say about it:
Ohm's law still applies: at the nano-scale level. The presumption was that quantum effects would take precident. I still think it will the smaller the technology gets and the more we demand of it. Meaning, we'll need some "replacements" as the nerd workforce ages. More kids need sci-fi to inspire them.
It's not too hard to extrapolate Xray vision, or at least how such a "super power" could work. "We have the technology..."
Terrahertz radiation, the dream of most pre pubescent and pubescent boys:
More on the Higgs Boson. If at first you don't succeed...
Happy Friday, Peeps! The Ig Nobel Awards...
We sometimes forget that the road of life we travel is fraught with "bumps" and challenges. This young lady is fulfilling her dream of getting a PhD in Astronomy and raising a child as a single mother...
Nobel From Space: apparently, the quazicrystal that garnered Daniel Shechtman of the Technion Israel Institute of Technology in Haifa last year's Nobel prize in chemistry is of extraterrestrial origin. A meteor this time, and not little green men...:-)
E-Book Boom Boosts Self-Publishers: thought I'd share what's already known.
Some fun with Double Entendre. Enjoy the embed below:
Another Dilbert Post (video embed), and deep, DEEP geek...
20 Years Post the Fall of Babel: I grew up with "duck-and-cover" and Dr. Strangelove scenarios running through my young head. "The Day After" wasn't just a Sci-Fi movie based on a nuclear attack in Kansas. It was a very real, thought out M.A.D. scenario that still exists today. Now, those former enemies are our only means of getting astronauts to the International Space Station, and that ability is threatened by their technical failures and our retirement of the Space Shuttle Program.
The original description of the Drake Equation, a calculation for the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence was that the species survive long enough to communicate, and everyone then knew what "survival" meant.
Hither this cauldron, came Star Trek, and Gene Roddenberry with enough hutspah to put the first interracial (and as I've pointed out - interspecies) kisses on television, "Plato's Stepchildren" was summarily banned in some southern markets.
And, let's not forget: "Let This Be Your Last Battlefield" where two alien species annihilated each other for which side the other was black (or white) on. The irony: they were mirror images of the other, but that did not matter.
We could survive our madmen, our Hitler, our Khan Noonien Singh, and ride triumphantly into a tomorrow of our own making.
Our myths, ancient or modern, give us a reason to go on, press forward, hope for a future that is better than the present.
CERN is where the excitement is in particle physics, looking for the so-called God Particle. Now, I see there's a conspiracy theory on the God Particle and the Illuminati. Really? Don't we have Ron Paul/Alex Jones for that?
Really, this is a neat perspective on the LHC and its research. The rush to say something reminds me of the hulabaloo over "cold fusion," which if you just think about it, is in itself a contradiction of terms.
Scientists compete for funding, and in the Internet age, that funding is directly proportional to relevancy. Everyone that reads a story about the CERN collider will ask two important questions:
W-I-I-T-F-M: "what's in it for me?"
W-I-I-U-C-M: "what is it ultimately costing me?"
Those two questions, along with our current intractable political climate, is the reason scientific advancement in non-consumer areas has slowed to a snail's pace.
I actually gave Scott Adams a story back-in-the day that he replied to, and used within 24 hours. Pure humor post.
Beauty, Anti-Beauty and the LHC: my goal of blogging about physics is twofold - one, to have a "water cooler" conversation, albeit monologue about the physics around everywhere - your mobile phone, climate change, the Internet; to make it less exotic and more ordinary. Two, to expose people of color to physics, particularly young people, and the possibility of pursuing careers in the sciences. Par for the online interview I listened to on Blog Talk Radio (this site), our youth don't see themselves in such careers, just what is "programmed" for them to accept about themselves. That, is true "brainwashing."
Science Fiction has played a role in the world we currently live in, the link is a small list, as sliding doors in department stores were inspired by two guys following the cues of Gene Roddenberry.
Earth's resources are finite, and like Wall-E, we'll eventually have to become a space-faring species. Such a human adventure, need not be "whitewashed."
Alluding to Star Wars, and fathoming the sheer distance 12.9 billion light years is.
Merry Christmas! Time for basketball.
