In the Dark

Since it’s New Year’s Eve I thought I would take the opportunity to wish you all the best for 2011.

Having recently read the STFC Delivery Plan it seemed appropriate to use the same style for my New Year’s greeting, but then I found Laurie Taylor in the Times Higher had beaten me to the idea and has given me the chance to indulge in a spot of shameless plagiarism:

Time has come to turn our faces towards the future that is to come. Time to evalulate our personal strategic objectives and  intended goal outcomes. Time to contemplate our game plan, examine core competencies, reinforce best practices, break out of our silos, exert maximum leverage, evolve new synergies, and maximise our skill set.

I wish you all a very happy New Year going forward!

OK, so the piece that prompted it was a bit silly, but this is an excellent riposte.

Jonah Leher in The New Yorker about the slipperiness of the scientific method: "The Truth Wears Off: Is There Something Wrong With The Scientific Method?" The test of replicability, as it’s known, is the foundation of modern research. Replicability is how the community enforces itself. It’s a safeguard for the creep of subjectivity. Most of the time, scientists know what results they want, and that can influence the results they get. The premise … Read More

via The Finch and Pea

I thought I’d reblog the following post from Andy Lawrence. I think it will be of interest to readers here because it relates to a very important issue. If you would like to read the full article please follow the link to Andy’s original post…

Yesterday I saw a Twitter link to  a New York Times article about an astronomer suing the University of Kentucky, claiming he was rejected as a job applicant because of his religious faith. This piqued my interest. When I got there I found it was someone I know reasonably well on a professional level – Martin Gaskell. Martin graduated from the Edinburgh astrophysics degree the year before me – 1975 – and is a well known AGN researcher. He is an i … Read More

via The e-Astronomer

I couldn’t resist reposting this. It’s hilarious.

(Note: this post is `just for fun;' no premeds, doctors, researchers, or nobel laureates were meant to be offended in the writing of this post.) The bane of many American physics grad students is teaching introductory physics to premed students. Due to the nature of med school admissions, one ends up with classrooms full of students who cannot afford to get anything less than an A+++ if they hope to make it to (Ivy League) Med School. Further, du … Read More

via An American Physics Student in England

I thought I’d re-post this poem by WH Auden which I put up about a year ago on the anniversary of the outbreak of World War 2. We’re in a different kind of struggle now, but his words are no less apt for that.

It’s now exactly 70 years since the start of World War Two, as it was on this date in 1939 that Germany invaded Poland. On hearing the news, WH Auden composed this poem. Although the poet himself grew to dislike it, it became one of his most famous poems and has many resonances still in today’s world. September 1st, 1939 I sit in one of the dives On Fifty-second Street Uncertain and afraid As the clever hopes expire Of a low dishonest decade: Wav … Read More

via In the Dark