Pure vanity drove me to post this screenshot of a nice write-up of this blog that appears in this month’s Physics World. You can read the whole edition online here if you have a subscription, but if you click on the image it’s more-or-less legible. They’ve written very nice things about In the Dark, so hope I don’t get into trouble with their copyright enforcers by posting this…
So here we are, then. The last day of term has finally arrived. Many of our students will be out partying tonight before they start a three-week break with little to disturb their relaxation but project reports, assignments and examination revision. Probably not all that relaxing at all then, especially for the final-year students.
For various reasons I’ve found this term very heavy going and am looking forward to spending some time away over the next couple of weeks. More about that in due course, assuming I have internet access…
The curious thing about the academic year is that since most UK universities switched to a semester system we’ve had to cope with the fact that Easter isn’t on a fixed calendar date. Last year, Easter was rather late so we managed to squeeze in a full 11 weeks teaching in before the vacation started. This year we’ve only got time for 9 weeks, so we resume teaching in three weeks’ time for another two weeks, followed by a revision week and the examination period. I think most students probably agree with me that this hiatus is extremely annoying.
This year Good Friday is on 6th April (a week today) and Easter Monday on 9th April; both are statutory (“bank”) holidays in the UK. Most universities have felt obliged to move their recess so that these two holidays occur outside term-time.
If I had my way we would have fixed semester dates so this nonsense of a 9+2 week teaching semester wouldn’t happen. Last year’s 11-week uninterrupted run was a slog, but I much prefer it over the stop-start affair we’re having this year.
I was a visiting professor at an American university over one Easter period many years ago. Given the fact that the Christian lobby is far more powerful over there than it is here I was quite surprised by the fact that there’s no real interruption for Easter. Lectures were held on Good Friday and there’s no Easter Monday holiday. Easter Sunday was definitely observed, but that had no effect on teaching.
The two Bank Holidays are a bit of a problem, of course, especially because they are followed by two more in May. However, when I was an undergraduate at Cambridge, we had lectures as normal on bank holidays. I’m not sure whether that practice was restricted to Oxbridge colleges – where term dates are different to elsewhere anyway – or some other Universities did the same. I don’t even know if Oxbridge still carries on over bank holidays today…
A better solution would be to distribute the statutory holidays more evenly through the year so they weren’t concentrated so inconveniently in Spring. There would be nothing to stop Christians taking a day’s leave in order to observe Good Friday, of course.
But since only a minority of British people are practising Christians, why are the rest of us forced to arrange our calendars according to archaic and irrelevant rituals? Far better, in my opinion, to give us all a day off for the start of the cricket season…
Grumble over, it just remains for me to wish my loyal readers (Sid and Doris Bonkers) all the best for the recess, and I hope it’s a good night at the Student Ball tonight!
Follow @telescoperSo the glorious weather continues. Unfortunately, unlike most UK universities, we’re not finished for Easter yet; at Cardiff University we only get three weeks for the Easter recess instead of the four that colleagues over the border seem to enjoy.
One of the consequences of this is that the annual National Astronomy Meeting (NAM) often falls in Cardiff term time. This year NAM is taking place in the fine city of Manchester (which, for those of you unfamiliar with British geography, is in the Midlands). Many colleagues in the School of Physics & Astronomy are attending NAM, and most of my research group are either there already or travelling up today. I particularly wish Jo and Ian well when they give their talks; one of the excellent things about NAM is the opportunity it offers for younger researchers to talk about their work to a large audience. Nerve-wracking, no doubt, but invaluable experience.
I’m not going to NAM this year because I have too much to do back here at the ranch, including filling in a few lectures for staff who are away. I’m always reluctant to cancel lectures during term-time, but in the current spell of good weather I doubt if any students would complain too much! I did a cosmology lecture this morning – only the second I’ve done here – and it the room was uncomfortably stuffy. A few of the students failed to fall asleep, however, so I regard that as a major success.
It’s strange how often good weather coincides with times of great stress for students. I recall that most of my undergraduate examinations took place in glorious sunshine, which seemed to have been laid on by some malevolent being to make us suffer. This week our students have project reports and presentations to worry about and other coursework to finish before term ends, as well as revision for the exams that take place in May; being couped up inside is no fun on days like this and I’m sure they’d prefer it to be raining outside so as not to distract them from the tasks in hand…
It’s so quiet around here today that it occurred to me now would be a good time to stage a Coup d’Etat. Come to thank of it, there’s a Staff Meeting been called on Wednesday which may well amount to something pretty similar…
Anyway, those of us around today have a nice event this evening to look forward to, a lecture by Lord Rees followed by a nice dinner in Aberdare Hall. Here’s the invitation:
You’ll see that this is organized “in association with The Learned Society for Wales“, which I only just learned about when I saw it on the invitation!
Anyway, the prospect of a slap-up dinner persuaded me to just have a sandwich for lunch. Now that’s eaten methinks I’ll get back to work!
UPDATE: It was indeed a very interesting and entertaining lecture by Lord Rees; here he is, in action, watched by Prof. Disney…
I was too tired last night to do anything but vegetate, and in the course of doing that I found a box of unsorted old photographs which made me all nostalgic. Here are some that reminded me of old friends. I don’t remember exactly when they were taken (probably in 1990), when I was visiting SISSA in Trieste. I don’t remember which particular trip it was or what paper resulted from it but I went there a number of times and had great fun. The first picture was taken in the office of Manolis Plionis, who is seated at the window facing the camera. In those days Manolis had a big motorbike, and I had a number of near-death experiences as his pillion passager on various high speed trips around Trieste, usually along the Strada Costiera…
To the right of Manolis is Francesco Lucchin (standing) with whom I co-authored a textbook on cosmology; Francesco sadly died in 2002. Seated in front of Francesco is Sabino Matarrese and at the computer is Lauro Moscardini.
I think these next two were taken over the nearby border in Slovenia at the end of a dinner but that is relying on my memory which, at my age, is not very reliable. Me and Lauro on the left with Sabino laughing at us. As usual.
And this was the same evening. On Francesco’s right is Paolo Catelan, with whom I also wrote a paper, but I have now completely lost touch with him…
Everyone looks very youthful in these pictures, but it was 20 years ago .. and we’ve all passed a lot of water since then.
Follow @telescoperI was walking into work yesterday morning, quietly minding my own business, but when I turned arrived at Queen Street I was suddenly confronted by a scary-looking armoured vehicle.
I’m not really up on this sort of thing, though there’s no doubt someone out there in internetshire who can tell me not only what kind of tank it is but what regiment it belongs to. Anyway, once I realised it wasn’t aiming its gun at me, I calmed down and figured it was probably taking part in some sort of display somewhere in Cardiff rather than heading towards the Senedd to participate in an imminent Coup D’Etat.
Tanks make me uncomfortable. A worse example than this happened when I used to live in Nottingham. Returning by train from somewhere or other I missed the connection at Derby and was stuck there late at night for the best part of an hour waiting for the next train home. As I sat there waiting there was a rumbling in the distance, and locomotive approached very slowly along the track pulling what must have been dozens of tanks perched on flat railway trucks. It was quite an impressive sight, but also a bit alarming. Where were they going? What were they up to? Is it really so unthinkable that one day vehicles like this will be used against civilians, as they have been in, say, the Middle East?
Although the thought of violent repression bothers me a little, it’s not the main reason why tanks make me nervous. Years ago – and I mean 20+ years ago – I was a long-term visitor in Copenhagen and during the course of my stay there was invited to a party in Christiania, a self-proclaimed autonomous region of the city. Things have probably changed a lot since then, but in those days it was quite a wild place and the drug-fuelled party I went to was definitely on the far side of out. Unbeknownst to me, someone spiked my drink with some sort of psychedelic substance (probably acid) and the subsequent trip was one of the worst experiences of my life. Terrified by grotesque hallucinations, I ran out of the house and was confronted in the street by dozens of (imaginary) tanks.
I woke up the next day under a bench in a public park, with no idea of where I was or how I’d got there. Presumably I had thought that the hiding place was so good that the tanks wouldn’t find me. Maybe one day they will…
Follow @telescoperIn response to a request to a while ago when I posted the Mathematics paper, here is the Physics paper I took as part of the Cambridge Entrance Examinations way back in 1981.
I’ve decided to try out Qu. 13 on my third-year students doing Nuclear and Particle Physics this year just for fun. Other comments on the content and/or difficulty are welcome through the box below!
Follow @telescoperAnd if I should falter
Would you open your arms out to me?
I’ve a lot to do today – a backlog of crosswords to clear, for one thing – so I’m going to indulge in a bit of recycling. I posted some years ago about internet anonymity in the wake of a spate of abusive comments on this blog. I’m not sure whether a spate can have a wake, actually , but I’ll press on regardless.
Today there’s a typically insightful piece by David Mitchell in the Observer on a similar topic, cleverly juxtaposing St Valentine’s Day (where anonymous messages are welcomed) with the rise of the internet troll whose messages are of a distinctly unwelcome character. I think he gets it just right (as usual):
Like love, hate is something that makes us go red in the face. It’s safer expressed covertly lest it be rejected.
I’ve encountered more recent – and much more serious – examples of what people are prepared to get up to under the cover of anonymity. I’ve refrained, and shall continue to refrain, from describing them in detail here. Some of my friends – and some of my students – know what I’m talking about. All that has now stopped, but if it starts again the gloves will definitely come off.
These experiences have confirmed my distaste for anonymity. I will therefore persist with my policy of requiring a proper email address for commenters on this blog. The address will not be revealed to the public, of course, and commenters are free to use pseudonyms if they wish. I can understand that people might want not to be identified if they say something controversial, especially if it amounts to whistle-blowing. However, if you wish to express opinions on my blog I think it’s not unreasonable for me to know who you are.
Anyway, the following is taken from an old post (from 2009) which arose from a story in the press at the time.
–o–
It’s not often that I blog about celebrity tittle-tattle – I have no idea who most “celebrities” are these days anyway – but a little story in last week’s Guardian online caught my eye. I thought I’d mention it here because it raises some interesting issues.
The story is of a fashion model, Liskula Cohen (whom I’d obviously never heard of). It appears that an anonymous blogger (with the charming pseudonym “Skanks”) wrote some derogatory remarks about said Ms Cohen on a website. The latter decided to sue for defamation, but that was difficult because the identity of the blogger wasn’t known. Cohen therefore went to court in an attempt to compel Google to identify the person responsible. She won that case, and duly found out that the blogger was a person called Rosemary Port (who I’d never heard of either). Anyway, to cut a long story short, Ms Cohen dropped her original lawsuit but Ms Port is now suing Google for handing over her real identity…
Of course the story is all a bit childish, but there is a serious question behind it, namely to what extent one has a right to anonymity. I’m not at all sure what the law says on this or what it should say, in fact, especially when it comes to the internet.
In Britain we don’t have identity cards (not yet anyway), so there’s a sort of de facto right to anonymity there. However, with the increasing levels of surveillance and state intrusion into people’s lives, that is changing. The issue generated by the story above, however, is how the right to anonymity extends into the blogosphere (or the internet generally) rather than how it applies in real life.
Some blogs I know are anonymous but I happen also to know who writes them. I presume the authors have reasons for wishing to conceal their identities so I wouldn’t dream of revealing them myself. However, these are all sites run by reasonably civilised people and it’s very unlikely that any of them would use their anonymity to engage in abusive or defamatory activities. If one of them did, I wouldn’t have any qualms at all about exposing their identity, but I’m not sure whether that would be a legally acceptable course of action.
But anonymity still makes me a bit uncomfortable. In academic life we come across it in the context of refereeing grant applications and papers submitted to journals for consideration. Usually the default is for referees to remain anonymous is such situations. Most referees are conscientious and if they have criticisms they are usually presented politely and constructively. There are, however, some exceptions. Fortunately these are few and far between, but there are some individuals who take the opportunity provided by anonymity to be downright abusive. Us old hands have sufficiently thick skins to brush such attacks off, but vitriolic comments made on papers written by inexperienced scientists (perhaps even research students) are completely out of order. This probably wouldn’t happen if referees didn’t have the right to remain anonymous. On the other hand, having your identity known might make it difficult for some to write critically of, say, the work of more senior scientists. Perhaps the answer is to retain anonymity but for the journal editor, for instance, to monitor the reports produced by referees and reprimand any who transgress.
Going back to the original subject of blogs, provides me with an opportunity to describe some of the behind-the-scenes issues with running this blog. In the beginning I decided to have an open comment policy so that anyone and everyone could comment without any form of intervention. That turned out to be a disaster because of the numbers of automatically generated SPAM comments that clogged up the boxes. I therefore switched on a SPAM filter so it could veto obvious garbage, but otherwise kept an open policy. The alternatives offered by WordPress include one that requires all comments to be from people registered at the site (which I thought would probably be a deterrent to people only wanting to comment on the odd post). Another option is to maintain a blacklist which treats all messages from persons on the list as SPAM. It’s also possible to block all comments entirely, of course, but I enjoy reading most of them so I think it would be a shame to do that just because of a few breaches of netiquette.
All went fairly well and I only had to ban a couple of individuals for abuse. However, over the course of the year I have received a steadily increasing number of crudely abusive comments (of a personal nature) from various anonymous sources. These are mostly depressingly puerile and they don’t affect me much but I find it very disconcerting to think that there are people sitting out there with nothing better to do.
Since WordPress notifies me every time a comment is posted, it is quite easy to remove this junk but I found it very tiresome (when there were several per day) and eventually decided to change my policy and automatically block comments from all anonymous sources. Since this requires a manual check into whether the identity information given with the comment is bona fide, comments from people who haven’t commented on this blog before may take a little while to get approved.
There are still comments on here which appear anonymous (or with a pseudonym), but these are from people who have identified themselves to me with a proper email address or who the software has identified through their IP address or information revealed by their web browser (which is probably more than you think…). I’m happy for people to comment without requiring they release their name to the world, and will do my best to ensure their confidentiality, but I’m not happy to publish comments from people whose identity I don’t know.
If you’re interested, as of today this blog has received 4105 comments in total, but only 1747 have been published. The rest were either SPAM or abuse. UPDATE: as of today, 19th February 2012, 11880 comments have been published and 86703 rejected…
Am I denying freedom of speech by rejecting anonymous comments? I don’t think so. If you want freedom of speech that much, you can write your own blog (anonymous or otherwise). And if every sight of this blog makes you want to write abusive comments, perhaps you should exercise your freedom not to read it.
I’d be interested to know from any fellow bloggers if they have the same problems with abusive comments. If not, perhaps I should start taking it personally!
More generally, I will not accept anonymous comments on the subject of the anonymity of comments, but any other contributions are welcome via the box.
Unless you’re banned.
Follow @telescoperA lot of these “occupation” pictures are going around on facebook, so I thought it would be fun to post those that encapsulate myself most accurately…
I’m not really an astronomer, but this is as close as I could get…
A few obvious inaccuracies in the next one but still pretty close to the truth!
The last one isn’t entirely accurate in my case – I’m more of a Port and Stilton type of chap…
And here’s one for the students…
I thought I’d take 5 minutes this lunchtime to add another item to the collection of old examination papers I’ve been posting, as someone asked me about this type of examination via a comment recently. This is the Mathematics paper I took way back in November 1981 for entry the following October to do Natural Sciences. I also took papers in Physics and Chemistry, as well as a General paper. Looking at this after a gap of over 30 years it looks pretty tough. One thing I should point out, though, is that the timing of the paper required us to come back after A-levels for an extra term (“the seventh term”) at my school, the Royal Grammar School in Newcastle, to form the “Third Year Sixth” who were all Oxbridge candidates. We were then intensively coached for the entrance examination. You will notice, for example, a couple of questions on this paper relating to group theory, which wasn’t on the A-level syllabus but which we were taught specifically for this examination. Some schools couldn’t offer this specialist teaching so pupils from them were significantly disadvantaged by this form of selection. As it happens, I answered both the (relatively easy) questions on group theory and got in to Cambridge…
Comments on the content and/or difficulty are welcome through the box below!
Follow @telescoper
In the Dark 