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Telling Our Stories...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on August 11, 2015 at 8:03am
Image Source: Science Diversity Group, USC Berkley

Topics: American Association of Physics Teachers, Diversity, Diversity in Science, Economy, Education, STEM, Women in Science

It's usually left to women teachers and people of color: African American, Asians, Hispanic/Latino to publicize or relate any information about specific characters or celebration months. I would have loved to participate in the American Association of Physics Teachers/AIP’s Teaching Guides on Women and Minorities in the Physical Sciences and participate in giving them feedback.

This blog started when I was employed as a physics and math teacher. It was a convenience to pull something up and project it on the screen in class, especially if it related to diversity. Some of my former students have found me on the Internet and in this format, I still "teach" them. I continue it universally for kids curious about science; adults that want to learn about STEM fields and teachers that can use my posts during African American History Month, Women's History Month and Hispanic Heritage Month as material or as a warm-up "hook" (it's kind of important for teenagers).

Our stories are the stories of this country; the inventions contributed by those who were deemed not worthy to produce anything at all contributed impacting, ground-breaking discoveries. They are under assault by the homophobic; racist; the sexist the xenophobic that would divide us and make "United States" an oxymoron. Ignoring our diversity will NOT bring us together as I've heard someone emphasize on the campaign trail: learning accurate histories eliminates ignorance, and ignorance is the father of intolerance.

We've come a long way, and we still have much further to go if we possess the courage for the journey. As a nation, we're in this together. Concrete, real world solutions, not soundbites and sloganeering - are what we need.

Nine teachers from California, Texas, Wisconsin, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, Virginia, Maryland, and Massachusetts participated, representing public and private elementary, middle, and high schools. They critiqued AIP’s Teaching Guides, digging deeply into some of the lesson plans, and offered ideas for how to include the stories of female and African American role models in a hands-on classroom. During the workshop, the teachers learned many things, including:
  • Students should know about several influential scientists such as Jocelyn Bell Burnell, Inge Lehmann, Mildred Dresselhaus, Sylvester James Gates, Jr., and Neil deGrasse Tyson.
  • Antinepotism laws kept women with PhDs from working at the same institutions as their husbands until the mid-20th century.
  • Women astronomers observed at Harvard Observatory before 1900.
  • Women worked on the Manhattan Project, at NASA, and in computing.
  • The first African American to obtain a PhD in physics was in 1876 (Edward Bouchet, Yale).
  • African-American physicists first found employment outside of historically Black colleges and universities with the US military, with NASA, and in other government scientific agencies.

American Institute of Physics:
Telling the stories of women and African Americans in the physical sciences
Scientific American:
Diversity in Science: Why It Is Essential for Excellence, Fred Guterl

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Behemoths and First Light...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on August 10, 2015 at 6:23pm
The European Extremely Large Telescope is under construction on Cerro Armazones, Chile. (Artist’s conception courtesy of ESO/L. Calçada.)
Citation: Phys. Today 68, 8, 24 (2015); http://dx.doi.org/10.1063/PT.3.2875


Topics: Astronomy, Astrophysics, Research, SETI, Telescopes


Among the science goals for three 30-m-scale telescopes is to seek signs of extraterrestrial life. But the big projects must first overcome big hurdles.

In what seems akin to winning the lottery, astronomers are moving ahead with not one, but three gigantic optical-IR telescopes, each with a price tag upwards of a billion dollars. The European Extremely Large Telescope (E-ELT) and the Giant Magellan Telescope (GMT) are both sited in Chile, and the Thirty Meter Telescope (TMT) is to be built on Mauna Kea in Hawaii.

For a given wavelength, the diffraction limit, which sets a telescope’s maximum possible resolution, shrinks as the primary mirror grows. “We will be able to take exquisitely sensitive images back to the beginning of the observable universe,” says TMT board member Michael Bolte of the University of California, Santa Cruz. With adaptive optics, the ground-based telescopes will have spatial resolution exceeding that of the Hubble Space Telescope by at least a factor of 10 and topping that of the 6.5-m James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), scheduled to launch in 2018.

The billion-dollar scale raises questions, says Matt Mountain, president of the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy. “What are the appropriate funding models? It’s fair to ask if we have enough resources globally to build, operate, and adequately instrument three of these as completely independent entities.”

The science goals are similar for the three telescopes: They will be used to search for biomarkers in the atmospheres of extrasolar planets and to study black holes, dark matter, dark energy, star and galaxy formation, the era of re-ionization, and more. But the telescopes differ in design, instrumentation, approaches to adaptive optics, and funding and organizational structures.

Each project faces its own technical, financial, and social hurdles; in particular, the GMT still has half a billion dollars to raise, and some native Hawaiians strongly oppose the building of the TMT on a mountain they hold sacred. But to first order, says Jochen Liske, acting program scientist for the E-ELT, “The challenge for all three projects is getting things right and producing a telescope that works.” They all aim to have first light in the early to mid 2020s.

Physics Today: Behemoth telescopes build toward first light, Tom Feder

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#TenThingsNotToSayToAWriter

Posted by William Hayashi on August 9, 2015 at 10:33am

#TenThingsNotToSayToAWriter is a trending hashtag on the internet and one which Jodi Picoult, Amy Tan and others are having fun with...so I thought I'd chime in. After three decades of living the writer's life, I have many more than ten juicy possibilities for this list. But here is my all-time personal favorite:

"I found your book at a garage sale! In the Free Box!"

Click here for the full story

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Buzz and Teaching...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on August 7, 2015 at 6:11am
Image Source: Technology Review


Topics: Artificial Intelligence, Computer Science, Humor, Robotics, Science Fiction


I thought these articles were related, and I admit somewhat intriguing. The first regards Buzz, which is described in the paper's abstract as "a novel programming language for heterogeneous robot swarms," though I'm not sure if "swarm" is the operative word they should have had in their description. The second is a post on Technology Review titled: "Teaching Machines to Understand Us." [Ahem] We have a few that can - well, extrapolate to some extreme thought processes - I'm thinking of the recent shots fired in the Jade Helm 15 military exercises [1], and outrageous behavior encouraged by conspiracy provocateurs (that haven't participated). It doesn't help that some very good science fiction has speculated on this quite a bit, and a few of my fellow humans can't delineate between fantasy and reality. [2]

Abstract

We present Buzz, a novel programming language for heterogeneous robot swarms. Buzz advocates a compositional approach, offering primitives to define swarm behaviors both from the perspective of the single robot and of the overall swarm. Single-robot primitives include robot-specific instructions and manipulation of neighborhood data. Swarm-based primitives allow for the dynamic management of robot teams, and for sharing information globally across the swarm. Self-organization stems from the completely decentralized mechanisms upon which the Buzz run-time platform is based. The language can be extended to add new primitives (thus supporting heterogeneous robot swarms), and its run-time platform is designed to be laid on top of other frameworks, such as Robot Operating System. We showcase the capabilities of Buzz by providing code examples, and analyze scalability and robustness of the run-time platform through realistic simulated experiments with representative swarm algorithms. [3]

The first time Yann LeCun revolutionized artificial intelligence, it was a false dawn. It was 1995, and for almost a decade, the young Frenchman had been dedicated to what many computer scientists considered a bad idea: that crudely mimicking certain features of the brain was the best way to bring about intelligent machines. But LeCun had shown that this approach could produce something strikingly smart—and useful. Working at Bell Labs, he made software that roughly simulated neurons and learned to read handwritten text by looking at many different examples. Bell Labs’ corporate parent, AT&T, used it to sell the first machines capable of reading the handwriting on checks and written forms. To LeCun and a few fellow believers in artificial neural networks, it seemed to mark the beginning of an era in which machines could learn many other skills previously limited to humans. It wasn’t. [4]

1. Jade Helm: The Insanity that Ate Texas, Jim Wright, Stonekettle Station
2. Why Operation Jade Helm 15 is freaking out the Internet — and why it shouldn’t be, Dan Lamothe, Washington Post
3. Physics arXiv:
Buzz: An Extensible Programming Language for Self-Organizing Heterogeneous Robot Swarms, Carlo Pinciroli, Adam Lee-Brown, Giovanni Beltrame
4. Teaching Machines to Understand Us, Tom Simonite

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Twittersphere and Fireworks...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on August 6, 2015 at 8:04am
Figure 2: Sample conversation graphs with retweet (top) and follow (bottom) features (visualized using the force directed layout algorithm in Gephi). The left side is controversial, (a,e) #beefban, (b,f) #russia march, while the right side is non-controversial, (c,g) #sxsw, (d,h) #germanwings.


Topics: Computer Science, History, Humor, Internet, Politics, Social Media


Poignantly, today is the 70th anniversary of the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima; as a species we entered the era where mass extinction became a troubling, crystallized thought. The BBC has a short presentation on their web site commemorating this history.

Equally significant and jarring: The first presidential debates are tonight from a party on the 50th anniversary of the Voting Rights Act, that has made disenfranchising minorities from the voting booths for a non-existent problem a political tactic. That, thanks to 5 justices on the Supreme Court (ONE which I can arguably say left the African American community despite his physical attributes decades ago), gutting the provision that covered nine states, eight of which in the old Confederacy. A conservative circuit court with clearer legal vision saw through the canard in Texas and put full stop to that dark procedure in the Lone Star State.

I will fortunately be at work during this "debate." I can only stomach so much bombast and hyperbolic over-the-top rhetoric. I'll likely look at the analysis, soundbites and yes: Tweets.

Sadly, like most of us, I'll be looking for the "fireworks."

TECHNOLOGY REVIEW: Many a controversy has raged on social media platforms such as Twitter. Some last for weeks or months, others blow themselves in an afternoon. And yet most go unnoticed by most people. That would change if there was a reliable way of spotting controversies in the Twitterstream in real time.

That could happen thanks to the work of Kiran Garimella and pals at Aalto University in Finland. These guys have found a way to spot the characteristics of a controversy in a collection of tweets and distinguish this from a noncontroversial conversation.

Various researchers have studied controversies on Twitter but these have all focused on preidentified arguments, whereas Garimella and co want to spot them in the first place. Their key idea is that the structure of conversations that involve controversy are different from those that are benign.

Physics arXiv: Quantifying Controversy in Social Media
Kiran Garimella, Gianmarco De Francisci Morales, Aristides Gionis, Michael Mathioudakis

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YOUR SUPPORT IS REQUESTED

Posted by Abdul H. Rashid on August 5, 2015 at 1:26am

This is the final 6 days of the Kickstarter campaign for the creator-owned original title BLEED 2039 thru my studio (AHR VISIONS) and I would REALLY appreciate your support in getting it fully funded! It is over 65% near goal and I am confident it can make it to the finish with the right backers!

Here is the link: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/291655160/bleed-2039

Thank you all in advance for any support you care to offer and please share!

~ AHR

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Small Solutions For Big Problems...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on August 5, 2015 at 7:24am
Image source: National Physical Laboratory

Topics: Carbon Nanotubes, Diversity, Diversity in Science, Engineering Physics, Materials Science, Nanotechnology, Semiconductor Technology, Women in Science

Stephanie Moroz and I share the same background in Engineering Physics and both in the same industry at the moment (she has extensive experience in other areas as well, and I'm not a CEO). She gives an excellent primer presentation at TEDx:

What is nanotechnology? Stephanie Moroz explores some of the ways that designing materials at an incredibly small scale can address global challenges in fields such as energy, medicine and electronics.

Stephanie Moroz is the CEO of Nano-Nouvelle, a Sunshine Coast company developing high-performance battery electrodes. Her international career has been dedicated to commercializing new technologies, particularly in the areas of energy efficiency and nanomaterials.

Stephanie is a truly global citizen. With her education in engineering physics, she has worked in Canada and then Germany where she led the integration of hydrogen fuel cells into the Mercedes F-CELL vehicle. From there she moved to France, developing systems to reduce the pollution generated by conventional vehicles. Finally, she was lured to Australia by opportunities in nanotechnology: first in solid-state hydrogen storage and now innovative battery materials at Nano-Nouvelle.

This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at http://ted.com/tedx
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Times Dark and Terrible...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on August 4, 2015 at 10:30am


Topics: Black Holes, CERN, God Particle, Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle, Humor, Large Hadron Collider, Particle Physics

Realize that the site Addicting Info usually titles its post with bombastic themes for equally outrageous stories. My response to this one regarding the latest conspiracy provocateur to enjoin that the Large Hadron Collider will "open other dimensions" or in a new twist, it's the "new Tower of Babel," and that its operation is a "dark and terrible chapter in human history." I posted the above meme sentiment and the following statement:

The "dark and terrible" chapter in human history is the willful choice of scientific ignorance in the 21st Century.

That got a lot of responses on Facebook, hundreds mostly positive with the exception of two trolls: one that ranted and the other that chimed in. They had their say and were brief and silent after that for the most part. The only dark and terrible time I can think of is the dark ages.

Willful meaning that with our access to the Internet and before that a public library, this kind of bombast without qualification is rather inexcusable. The only motivation is to pull a certain section of society towards your worldview; the only strength of your position is their ignorance, which unlike Thomas Gray's Ode on a Distant Prospect at Eton College, is not "bliss" or necessity: it is control.

A brief history of accelerators and particle physics:

Accelerators: John D. Cockcroft and Ernest Walton at the Cavendish Laboratory in Cambridge, England, sought a way into the nucleus through a prediction of quantum mechanics. George Gamow had suggested that a particle with too little energy to overcome the electrical repulsion of the nucleus through the barrier. (The trick was that the energy of the particle was not actually well-defined, according to Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle). In 1930 Cockcroft and Walton used a 200-kilovolt transformer to accelerate protons down a straight discharge tube, but they concluded that Gamow's tunnelling did not work and decided to seek higher energies. [1] The Bubble Accelerator was designed by Donald A. Glaser, a popular apocryphal story about him contemplating the design over beer: it's something you hear as an undergrad and never, ever forget! He did win the Nobel Prize in 1960 for the Bubble Chamber.

Some examples:

Van der Graaf generator: If your high school physics teacher had you touch it and your hair stood on end like an Afro, THAT was a particle accelerator, no dimensions were opened or damaged in these experiments.

X-rays and nMRI: Nuclear Magnetic Resonance Imaging comes to mind. If you've had these procedures in a medical event, you have particle physics to thank for it.

Related info:

Black Holes: The byproduct of Red Giant stars that collapse after their nuclear fuel is spent at the end of their lifetimes. Our own sun at its end will likely become a Brown or White Dwarf, as it's not that massive. A large part of the analysis to even propose Black Holes was developed during the Second World War in the development of the atomic bomb. It was once so extreme, not even Einstein believed they could exist, though General Relativity pretty much predicted it. [2, 3]

CERN: European Organization for Nuclear Research. Here's a link that is a PDF on technological spin offs, some of which are things like, I don't know: the World Wide Web. The rants I've seen on web sites (or, even responses to some of my posts in the past) are breathtaking in their hypocrisy. I'd have more respect for a group that sincerely went back to snail mail, the Abacus and Slide Rule (I have the latter). There's even spin offs for treating cancer and solar panels.

The God Particle: Also known as the Higgs Boson. It was coined by Nobel Prize winning physicist Leon M. Lederman and science writer Dick Teresi in a book by the same name, the subtitle an obvious nod to "Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy": The God Particle: If the Universe is the Answer, What Is the Question? Lederman often joked due to the frustration at the time not having found it - with a colorful metaphor what else he would like to have called it. In this case, 42 didn't quite cover it.

Particle Physics: "Particle physics is the branch of physics that studies the nature of the particles that constitute matter (particles with mass) and radiation (massless particles). Although the word "particle" can refer to various types of very small objects (e.g. protons, gas particles, or even household dust), "particle physics" usually investigates the irreducibly smallest detectable particles and the irreducibly fundamental force fields necessary to explain them. By our current understanding, these elementary particles are excitations of the quantum fields that also govern their interactions. The currently dominant theory explaining these fundamental particles and fields, along with their dynamics, is called the Standard Model. Thus, modern particle physics generally investigates the Standard Model and its various possible extensions, e.g to the newest "known" particle, the Higgs boson, or even to the oldest known force field, gravity." Wikipedia

Wormholes: See Kip Thorne's book below [2]. It was the Einstein-Rosen Bridge seen in the movies Contact from Carl Sagan's novel and most recently, Marvel's Thor. An advanced civilization that lived beyond its technological adolescence (i.e., they didn't blow themselves to kingdom come) could probably engineer one.

So, rather than a soundbite, I thought it important to give longer explanations. It's easier to find out How Accelerators Work [4] by simply going to a site where experts give an explanation for consumption by the general public.

As a country, we have a historic fear and loathing of science - the aforementioned bomb [3] and the Tuskegee Experiments didn't help. This "dark and terrible chapter" for the most part had a lot of positive spin offs that have benefited everyone. Now, ignorance is a choice, but not a permanent state of affairs. As Carl Sagan said, "We live in a society exquisitely dependent on science and technology, in which hardly anyone knows anything about science and technology." That state can be remedied.

1. American Institute of Physics: Early Particle Accelerators
2. "Black Holes and Time Warps-Einstein's Outrageous Legacy," Kip Thorne
3. #P4TC: M.A.D...
4. CERN: How Accelerators Work

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The Introduction of JC Henry

Posted by JC Henry on June 4, 2015 at 11:30am

     I have been here at BSFS for about 2 maybe 3 months.  I should have written something and posted here a while ago.  I have been handling this writing path so badly I am not always sure what to do next.  So with that in mind.  I am re-posting a piece I did about the relaunch of jchristinahenry.com.  Last year  I came to terms with what I could do and what I couldn't.   I was tired of my writing being marginalized by everyone, myself included.  I decided to give it the priority I believed it should have had all the time.  Hence the remaking of the Flagship. 

     J. Christina Henry (JC) became a writer, when she was 12 years old.  JC had various reasons the two most important now are:

          1.  She always told herself stories.  They were her bedtime stories.  Original stories or          additions to her established favorites, JC later learned that it was called fan fiction.

          2.  The year before in 6th grade she committed plagiary.  She felt very guilty about it but        could not admit it until she was older.  She needs to redeem herself and create an original story.

     Fueled with the stories of the Sweet Valley High series, anything produced by Harlequin and Silhouette romance, Greek mythology and fairy tales.  JC knew she could write a story with the same feel of her idols.  JC began to struggle with  a Cinderella type story and character development.  It was an arduous process.  Since JC knew nothing about writing.

     JC told everyone she knew that writing was her calling.  She had dream of becoming an acclaimed author and a movie deal.  It didn't seem impossible for a young girl from Brownsville, Brooklyn. Then a relative read her work out loud without permission.  JC was devastated.  She wasn't ready and the story wasn't either.  The story was really bad, not worth printing.   It was the worst moment in her life.   JC couldn’t fix the story and the desire to continue writing had died.  She believed she was done with it and considered a career in teaching or librarian science.  Although it was seriously wounded the inclination to be a storyteller was strong.  It was seriously wounded but came back.  JC found a new possible story.  She delved into epic fantasy, leaving the genre which would be called later young adult romance alone.

      In the 1990”s JC was in high school.  It seemed to her that there was  type of black writer’s spring. Many new African -American writers debuted.  JC was exposed to Terry McMillan, Bebe Moore Campbell, Sandra Kitt, Rochelle Alers, Brenda Jackson and Valerie Wilson.  JC read stories in every genre and believed that she had an original idea in each.  But she wasn't consistent.  Then she found Octavia E. Butler and later in the decade Nalo Hopkinson.  These writers inspired her to write paranormal/speculative fiction.

 

   JC has worked in this genre for many years.  That bad reading experience made her wary of showing her work.  For many years she worked without critical feedback to guide her work.  As a result, she most likely got lost on decent underdeveloped ideas and couldn't get back on track with them and lost interest.  She had a day job to support herself and small family.  She told herself that she didn't need critical acclaim, notoriety or a movie deal.   She doesn't need to be a literary great or a newly recognized one.  JC writes now for the pleasure of the word.   The understanding that although her stories may sometimes seem similar to others ( Another fear that stunted her work), her stories are her own because no one can tell them like she can.   With this epiphany, JC began sharing pages of her work with a writer’s group in Atlanta.  JC and family lived there for a few years before moving back to NYC.  The first writers group was a great experience.   It took her longer than expected but JC found a group in NYC.  She attended faithfully for a summer and learned helpful tip for her work.  She also read her work out loud for the first time. It was frightening but positive.  She didn’t wow her audience with her brilliant story; they let her finally notice problem areas.

     

 Some might wonder what is the point of all this.  This blog was renamed the Flagship.  It has been active for almost 4 years or more.  JC cannot recall posting her work on this blog.  She has whined about not being read (no real comments), not being skinny, not being employed.  She may have complained about being single, having writer's blog or reader’s block etc.   She will also attempt to be  less self -deprecating and more optimistic.  She may have attempted to write reviews on the things she likes books, movies, anime etc.  But not her stories.  So coming soon (mostly at the end of February), JC will post some of her fiction on this site.  She hopes it will interest, entertain and attract readers.  She has no illusion that it will catch a book deal but if that should happen she will not throw it away.

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We, Oligarchy...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on August 2, 2015 at 6:18am
Image Source: IMDb


Topics: Democracy, Exceptionalism, Internet, Oligarchy, Republic


We are now days from the first debates of the presidential cycle - The Cycle, NOW with Alex Wagner and the Ed Show cancelled on MSNBC due to executives kowtowing at the arcane Nielsen altar, which worked well when you had only ABC, CBS NBC and a few UHF channels: on-demand television and cable viewing, Net Flicks, Amazon Prime et al and pretty much NO ONE in America working a standard 9 - 5 whereby they can park and watch Walter Cronkite at 6:30 pm has somewhat changed the game for the non-Fox audience that's not older, whiter, more conservative and semi or fully retired. We've been in the throws of reality television since Candid Camera in 1948. It has been the recent advent of Internet technology; instantaneous gratification by pointing and clicking that allows us all to "vote" for our favorite dancer/singer from the comfort of our living rooms that have allowed us all to participate in what used to be merely voyeurism with the boob tube. I currently have several apps on my smart phone, one of them allowing me to order a sandwich - days in advance - and pick it up at the shop at an appointed time and on a "rapid pick up" shelf.

"The Donald": a self-made billionaire with cheap toupee or poor comb over inherited his fortunes from his self-made millionaire father, and continued in the family business. He's had a triplet series of traditional marriages and far more bankruptcies. Someone at a New Hampshire focus group said: "he's just like us" while another woman said "he was classy." Unless you are worth billions and have a string of marriages and business bankruptcies, he's not "just like us"; and madam: if a bloviating bigot is your definition of "classy," I fear you need to get out more.
Image source: Super Mario Wiki and this blog

The Donald is a reality TV star - part of a long list of reality shows I don't watch - host of The Apprentice - and publisher of several books on his business philosophy and self-importance. He's been around notoriety-wise since the 1980's when he was much thinner and had exceptionally more hair. And now, his time has come. We have been conditioned like Pavlov's dogs from the sixty-seven year onslaught of filler television programming to consider his bid for the presidency genuine. We had a B-movie actor - why not The Donald? Conventional wisdom is he would have imploded by now and slinked back to his show with a boost in draconian Nielsen ratings. He's not doing it now. The oligarchs are likely quite confused, amused and nervous. As the departing Jon Stewart remarked [paraphrased]: "as a 1%er, he's supposed to BUY politicians, not actually become one." For the likes of the Koch brothers, the sock puppets Scott Walker and Chris Christie are "their kind of guys." The Donald is a loose and unpredictable cannon, following the formula that gets your reality primary high ratings. By going with the top 10 averaged in national polls, it encourages bombast and outrageous behaviors such that it is essentially what the GOP primary has become.

From above: "I currently have several apps on my smart phone, one of them allowing me to order a sandwich - days in advance - and pick it up at the shop at an appointed time and on a 'rapid pick up' shelf." Question: if we can do this with apps to get food and vote for our favorite contestant on "reality TV," why are we NOT doing it for the voting franchise? With mobile technology, ~90% of 311 million people voting would be a far louder voice than "corporations are people" Citizens United decisions that ushered in this current non-democratic (or, republic for that matter) model. Former President Carter disabused us of any illusions if we weren't already.

Answer: it would be "too much democracy." Now, that sounds horrifying on its face, but as a nation, we're somewhat prone not to reason, examination of facts/details/data and debate, but someone who sounds confident; "the decider" who "goes with his gut"; rides tall in the saddle even though he had as many deferments as Dick Cheney during the Vietnam conflict. The aforementioned, underlined link in the first sentence is one of many I found just searching on the term itself. Carnival barkers of Trump's mold - like used car salesmen - don't have to BE genuine, but like reality TV, they MUST at least sound genuine. We are ripe for an authoritarian, carnival barker or otherwise.

George Carlin - public intellectual, ever timely and prescient of the current election cycle with his stand-up: "Dumb Americans." American Exceptionalism is the mythology we tell ourselves, and provocateurs like Trump - strides in and yells it loud to adoring crowds. He has no solutions; no specifics. His hand gestures have become caricature, yet his appeal is due to the systematic dumbing down we've experienced for a little over two generations now. Science and technology - paramount to our survival - will exist in a parallel reality, its warnings ignored, as obedient Pavlov hounds bay at the previous month's blue moon and the rich wolves count the dividends they will send overseas, away from these shores, its crumbling roads, schools and infrastructure.

To quote Lawrence Lessig, we are a Republic, Lost.


An enlightened citizenry is indispensable for the proper functioning of a republic. Self-government is not possible unless the citizens are educated sufficiently to enable them to exercise oversight. It is therefore imperative that the nation see to it that a suitable education be provided for all its citizens. It should be noted, that when Jefferson speaks of "science," he is often referring to knowledge or learning in general.
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US military test a non-lethal gun that can terrify an enemy with sound

Posted by LN Gibson on August 1, 2015 at 1:07pm

The US military is developing a new non-lethal weapon that uses an incredibly loud sound to startle an enemy into retreating.

The Laser-Induced Plasma Effect (LIPE) weapon was designed by the Joint Non-Lethal Weapons Program (JNLWP), which is part of the US Department of Defense. It works by making use of plasma, a type of matter that isn't a liquid, solid or gas.

In the plasma stage, high doses of energy have pulled electrons from their atomic nuclei, creating ions, and this produces a type of matter that has both electrical and magnetic properties and can take on the form of light.

The idea is for the LIPE weapon's lasers to fire directed high energy in extremely short bursts that last for only a nanosecond (a billionth of a second). The energy creates a blue ball of plasma and further blasts of energy from the lasers manipulate the ball to make a super loud, 130-decibel sound that sounds like a fighter jet has come out of nowhere next to the target.

Continued...

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Crazy Dentist

Posted by G.H. Wright on July 31, 2015 at 4:00pm
I get that people like to be macho and shoot things, but when big cats, especially lions are injured they turn maneater. What if the hunt was unsuccessful and that lion turned to hunting the elderly and children. He could have volunteered to perform dental work on lions. You know, to keep their teeth healthy to prevent them from going maneater and he could still have shot something (WITH A TRANK GUN). Maybe that should be his community service, not saying he should go to jail.GHWright, promoting reasonable insanity since 2010.
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Kirigami Transistors...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on July 31, 2015 at 1:51pm
On the left is a paper model of the kirigami-inspired graphene pyramid, which is the square object in the microscope image on the right. Also shown in the microscope image are a spiral spring (top) and a number of cantilevers (right). The scale bar in the microscope image is 10 μm long. (Courtesy: McEuen Group, Cornell University)

Topics: Consumer Electronics, Electrical Engineering, Nanotechnology, Semiconductor Technology

A stretchable and bendable transistor has been made by researchers in the US by applying the principles of kirigami – the Japanese art of paper cutting – to graphene. The researchers have also made tiny graphene-based hinges and pyramids, and they are confident that they could reduce the size of their devices to the nanometre scale. The team also points out that the current micro-scale devices could be useful for biocompatible electronics, including probes for the study of neurons.

The mainstay of the electronics industry, silicon, is rigid and brittle, and is therefore not appropriate for making deformable electronics. The ability to deform is particularly useful for electronic devices that interface with biological organisms, for example sensitive prosthetic skin and subcutaneous sensors, which must bend and stretch with surrounding tissue. Graphene is a flexible sheet of carbon just one atom thick, and could offer a way to create deformable electronics because of its high electrical conductivity. One problem with graphene, however, is that it stretches very little.

Nanoscientist Paul McEuen and colleagues at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, were inspired to try graphene kirigami after they investigated the bending stiffness of the material. They used an infrared laser beam to press on a gold pad located on the tip of a graphene cantilever that is about 10 μm long. By measuring the displacement in response to the known force of the laser photons, they calculated the bending stiffness of the material. They also monitored the thermal oscillations of a graphene cantilever and calculated the stiffness from the oscillation amplitude.

Physics World: Stretchable graphene transistors inspired by kirigami, Tim Wogan

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Millennials and Big Science...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on July 30, 2015 at 8:17am
Image Source: American Association for the Advancement of Science (link below)


Topics: Diversity, Diversity in Science, Economy, Education, Science, STEM, Research


It's easy to bash millennials until you're in two classrooms with them. I taught Algebra, Pre Calculus and Physics between two campuses in Texas: Hutto and Manor High Schools respectively.

They're a lively bunch; probably better than an Expresso if you "really" want to wake up (or, even if you don't).

It's nice when someone of Dr. Gate's stature recognizes and encourages it as well.

I have a selfish interest encouraging this observed collaborative spirit as well: I'd like to retire with the store "fully functional" on my departure from the workforce (one day).

I thoroughly enjoyed my "coming of age" in the 1980s, but I do envy millennials - this is your time: a time of both great perils to be solved and great wonders to be discovered. It depends on what you're willing to step forward and emphasize that will shape the future, quite literally for the entire planet and species.

The U.S. R&D enterprise needs more support, but millennials, born near the end of the 20th century, share characteristics that will serve them well if they become scientists, S. James Gates Jr. said at the AAAS-Hitachi lecture.

The United States used science and technology to great economic benefit after World War II and can continue to "master the innovation cycle" by drawing on the collaborative nature of millennials who started to come of age as the century turned, a leading physicist told a AAAS gathering recently.

S. James Gates Jr., a theoretical physicist at the University of Maryland and self-described policy wonk, shared his thoughts on the future of "big science" and the challenges the nation faces as it responds to increased scientific and economic competition from abroad.

He noted that millennials, those born between 1982 and 2000, now make up a larger percentage of the U.S. population than the baby boomers born after World War II. According to the Census Bureau, millennials number 83.1 million and account for more than one quarter of the U.S. population while the boomers number 75.4 million. The millennial generation also is more diverse, Gates said, offering the possibility that creative new approaches to science may emerge.
From Forbes: "Why You Can't Ignore Millennials," Dan Schawbel

The millennials show a willingness to embrace dramatic social shifts, are comfortable with the new technologies that have connected us via the Internet, and exhibit "a far more collaborative" streak than some previous generations, Gates said. That willingness to work in groups, share information and ideas, and collaborate on projects is highly compatible with the methods and goals of science, and Gates said it is something to be admired and fostered.

AAAS: Collaborative Spirit of Millennial Generation May Benefit Big Science, Earl Lane

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Managing Files; Categories and File Organization

Posted by Ricardo Holliman on July 29, 2015 at 11:46am

                        

       If you guys read my previous blog on File Organization. You will clearly see how unorganized and scattered my files were. I had 133 Transportation  graphics. I did the file and pile method where I will pile my files and look for it later. That is okay for an amateur who is doing personal projects for friends and family members. It is not an okay practice when working among professionals and corporate clients.  

       

     If you are in the creative field where you are a producer; writer; graphic, and motion designer; animator; video editor; website builder,etc. This blog is for you. I had 864 files of Illustrator Vectors that were scattered out in just one folder that were not identifiable. Out of 864 were the 133 Transportation graphics you seen in the previous blog.  I finally got it organized where I can quickly identify and find what I am looking for. Putting these files in categories makes a big difference.

        

     In this picture you can see the preview pane in the left showing the folders I created. Next to the preview pane you can see how I put the 133 Transportation graphics in categories.  The folder I created was VEHICLE EXT. Under that category I created sub categories and folders.  With vehicles you have to be specific according to their model and weight. 

       The problem was I was naming them common names such as Cars and Trucks.  When file naming the vehicles Cars 1; Car 2; Car 95; Luxury Super Car;  I was  doing a keyword shortcut so I can search easily search it. When I was trying to find a specific car model. I went from Arkansas to Japan to find it. It took at 10 minutes or more to go find  the right car model I wanted to use in a design.

     It was frustrating going through a pile of files with the name Car at the end of it to find the right one. I realized it was time to put this vehicle models in categories and be as descriptive as possible. I created 11 folders with their sub categories within that folder. The key to better computer file organization for creative people is the method Category and Find.

       The Category and Find method will help you to identify your files easily. You can find the folder associated with those files easily than to find scattered files with no categories.  Take an extra three to four hours to organize your files using this method.  You don't want to wait to get on team projects and not being able to deliver because of files disorganization. 

        In my next blog if you are working on multiple projects and you have more than 6,000 files.  Be sure to check out my next blog called Projects and Non Projects.

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Author Special

Posted by Roy M. Eavins II on July 29, 2015 at 6:21pm

This is the first part of our effort to build a base of Black Businesses who are willing to work with a Black Owned and Operated Media outlet dedicated to building the Black Community!!! Please tag and share it with anyone you know who has a book to promote!

So here is the deal we will offer to Authors in order to promote their books via our Black College Sports Network. Starting the weekend of Sept. 5th we will be broadcasting live from some of the top HBCU football games in the country. What do you do: Pay $100 and provide a standing banner to the network. What do you get: 100 60 second radio ads on the V108 radio network of your choice (Gospel, Urban or Talk) for one month (Sept-Nov), interviewed on one of the network talk shows and your banner posted at 3 games of your choice. Game choice is on a first come first serve basis. Game schedule will be released on Saturday August 22nd at our BCSN GameTime season kick off broadcast!

If your book is out or is coming out by November you can get in on Football season but we will be doing the same deal for Basketball season as well. Inbox me if you have more questions or you can make your payment PayPal to info@myjbn.com This deal is limited to 75 authors and the first 7 to sign up will get their 100 60 second radio ads and 25 video ads for all 3 months on our online tv station and all 3 radio stations!

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Pig Fat Laser...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on July 29, 2015 at 7:15am
Technology Review: A piece of pig skin glows with laser light after being stimulated by an optical fiber.

Topics: Biomedicine, Humor, Laser, Modern Physics, Optical Physics, Photonics, Research

Yes, you read the post title right, and it's referenced in the title of the article at Technology Review. The technique has also apparently been done with human samples. I could only grin as I know a few of my Jewish and Muslim friends and family members who probably wouldn't think of such a device as "kosher."

Researchers have made pig-skin lasers. Yes, pig laser beams.

The technology, outlined in a paper published today in Nature Photonics, showed that pumping light into fat cells could turn them into tiny, self-contained lasers.

The microlaser technique could afford scientists new ways to study and use cells, but mostly it’s just “very cool,” says Russ Algar, an assistant professor at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, Canada, who wasn’t involved in the work.

MIT Technology Review: Making Pig Fat into a Laser, Karen Weintraub

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Qubits and Black Holes...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on July 28, 2015 at 9:34pm
Image Source: Fig 2, CERN Courier article

Topics: Black Holes, Cosmology, General Relativity, High Energy Physics, Particle Physics, Relativistic Quantum Mechanics, Theoretical Physics

Abstract


We demonstrate an algorithm for the retrieval of a qubit, encoded in spin angular momentum, that has been dropped into a no-firewall unitary black hole. Retrieval is achieved analogously to quantum teleportation by collecting Hawking radiation and performing measurements on the black hole. Importantly, these methods only require the ability to perform measurements from outside the event horizon and to collect the Hawking radiation emitted after the state of interest is dropped into the black hole.

Physics arXiv: How to Recover a Qubit That Has Fallen Into a Black Hole
Aidan Chatwin-Davies, Adam S. Jermyn, Sean M. Carroll

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Computer Files Organization: Nightmare If Not Done

Posted by Ricardo Holliman on July 27, 2015 at 3:12pm

   If you are looking at this picture and wondering what the hell is this; these are my transportation graphics dealing with airplanes, boats, bus, compact cars, ships, semi trucks,etc. Since I am a graphic designer and working on an animation show; I need my graphics to do these things. I have a total of 133 transportation  graphics and I pile it up in one folder called VEHICLE EXT.

      Looking at this was a nightmare because it was so unorganized and all over the place. How am I going to quickly find what I am looking for? The method I used was pile and find method.. I piled my items in one group and typed keywords to help me find what I was looking for. I did this method for years until I realized I am working with a team of professionals critiquing my organization skills. I realized time will not be on my side when I do professional work for clients.

       I read several article that talks about how amateurs are poor  when it comes to file organization.  They gave me insight how to file organize the professional way. The Pile and Find method is the way I used for a while. This picture is an example of the Pile and Find method. The method I am implementing is Category and Quick Access. I will explain that in the next blog. Don't let your files pile up on you. Start organizing your files ASAP.

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Weyl Fermions...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on July 27, 2015 at 8:29am
The surface of the double-gyroid photonic crystal used by Marin Soljačić and colleagues. A US dime is shown for scale. (Courtesy: Ling Lu)

Topics: Consumer Electronics, Particle Physics, Photonics, Quantum Computer, Theoretical Physics

Evidence for the existence of particles called Weyl fermions in two very different solid materials has been found by three independent groups of physicists. First predicted in 1929, Weyl fermions also have unique properties that could make them useful for creating high-speed electronic circuits and quantum computers.

In 1928 Paul Dirac derived his eponymous equation, which describes the physics of spin-1/2 fundamental particles called fermions. For particles with charge and mass, he found that the Dirac equation predicts the existence of the electron and its antiparticle the positron, the latter being discovered in 1932.

However, there are other solutions of the Dirac equation that suggest the existence of more exotic particles than the familiar electron. In 1937 Ettore Majorana discovered a solution of the equation that describes a neutral particle that is its own antiparticle: the Majorana fermion. Although there is no evidence that Majorana fermions exist as fundamental particles, Majorana-like collective excitations (or quasiparticles) have been detected in condensed-matter systems. Another solution of the Dirac equation – this time for massless particles – was derived in 1929 by the German mathematician Hermann Weyl. For some time it was thought that neutrinos were Weyl fermions, but now it looks almost certain that neutrinos have mass and are therefore not Weyl particles.

Now, a group headed by Zahid Hasan at Princeton University has found evidence that Weyl fermions exist as quasiparticles – collective excitations of electrons – in the semimetal tanatalum arsenide (TaAs).

Physics World: Weyl fermions are spotted at long last, Hamish Johnston

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