I almost forgot about this webpage. But I figure I can use it as a place to store my thoughts for future reference or when my mind is all by its lonesome.
So yesterday, I had the pleasure of attending a talk by Norman Chomsky. The talk was meant to be about the Arab Spring movement, but touched more broadly on the American (and British and French) response to democratic movements since the end of World War II. It was a good history lesson, and had good, witty analysis. No pictures because I had a good seat (second row, center), and you can’t really take a picture of someone from that close when they’re looking right at you and still maintain your dignity. It ain’t right.
On a tangentially related note (both to Chomsky and myself), I’d like to note these two articles I came across, both written about the same topic (the James Sherley tenure case), and from very different perspectives.
*From The Scientist
*From Boston Magazine
I am not a fan of self-victimization, and the Boston Magazine article—especially the end of it—makes it clear how easy this is to do.
I’ve finally updated my joke articles. It’s been a while. The last year hasn’t been so productive for me, and I probably used my thesis as an excuse, but it isn’t. I’ve got several more joke ideas coming, and have written 3 songs in the last week (“Good Friday”, “For Mona”, “Cesare Borgia”), all of which I quite like, though the last two are probably more song material, the first being more of a poem. I’m envisioning a collection to be called “For Mona”; after all, there are only really only ever two good times to write songs, and this is one of them. So I’m looking forward to getting back to that and my drawing compositions.
I have been listening to a lot of nice songs lately. Some from random places, some from the California yesteryear: “You Ain’t Alone” by the Alabama Shakes, “You Keep Me Hanging On” by the Supremes (Motown killer), “Praise You” by Fatboy Slim, “Wrong Way” by Sublime, “She’s Got Issues” by The Offspring. The last is one of those I wish I could’ve written.
I found myself watching a lot of Star Trek over the holiday. Can I just say that T’Pring is hot? Also, I came across this.
Speaking of the holidays, I spent a wonderful 3 weeks at home in California. It was warm (it’s always nice when you can go into the ocean without wetsuit), relaxing, and fun. It’s lame coming back freezing cold and wind and rain. When I finish up my quals, I’d like to go somewhere similarly nice, relaxing, and warm. I’m thinking somewhere in the South Pacific (Tahiti maybe) or South East Asia (perhaps Bali).
Another cool article. My cosmology professor from last semester has done a lot of work with SDSS.
I came across this guy’s webpage the other day, as well. He suffers from many of the classic symptoms of the crank (see here, courtesy of John Baez, and here, courtesy of Warren Siegel). Another interesting example here (see his account of an interaction with Steve Weinberg here and his responses to those who disagree with him here). Cranks often display delusions of grandeur, compare themselves to folks like Einstein, and self-victimize, in addition to typically displaying fundamental misunderstandings of the fields they try to tackle. It seems perhaps some level of mental illness to be blamed. I would also like to add that, while it is common for cranks or quacks to deride the “scientific mainstream”, being a part of that in no way means that one is kowtowing to convention or is unoriginal. On the contrary, to be a good scientist, one must be extremely creative and original. Things become an acceptable part of science because they give predictions that can be independently verified by anyone and hence be established as scientific truth.
Cranks often like to compare themselves to Einstein to make the point that work initially considered out of the mainstream can eventually be acknowledged as a work of genuine talent (interestingly, Einstein’s work seems, too, to be a most common target of such folks). But I can promise that work that is genuine science will always be recognized as such after not too long since it will provide testable hypotheses and predictions or be verified by others.
Finally, I spent some time with my grandma (whom we call “Baa”) during the holiday, as she developed pneumonia. She’s 82, so we obviously got concerned, but she is now in a senior home and she seems to be doing fine (we gave her a DVD player, and she watches religious programming nonstop, which makes her very happy). My dad went to see her more frequently, and he mentioned to me that, during one visit, she asked him if I was getting married soon. My dad’s response was, “He’s waiting for the right person.” Well, yes and no. If there was, then maybe I would consider, but finding out if that’s the case is awful tricky. Right now my thoughts are, “Why would I be stupid enough to tie myself down legally to someone else?”, especially when someone can go off the rails at any time? I’ve seen enough unpleasant marriages in my life, and the thought makes me quite literally nauseated.