December 19, 2010
Category: Links Dump
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"At the end of the day, what this means is that if you want to serve your country and put your life on the line to defend the freedoms enjoyed by Republican U.S. senators, those senators will begrudgingly and belatedly allow you to do so if you are gay or lesbian. But if you want to serve your country and put your life on the line to defend the freedoms enjoyed by Republican U.S. senators and you're also brown-skinned and weren't born here, then most of those senators would sooner see you deported than to allow you to express your patriotism for a nation they don't want to acknowledge you're a part of."
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"When it comes to Christmas trees, for instance, which is better for the planet: the long-lasting artificial kind, or the freshly cut, pine-scent-and-sap variety?
As I report in Saturday's Times, at least one major study found that the real tree is probably the better choice. But as I found during my reporting, many consumers still believe that a faux fir is less harmful to the environment than the real thing.
That's because an artificial tree can be used again and again, unlike a real tree, which is tossed out at the end of the season. Yet as it turns out, that's not enough to tilt the scales in the faux fir's favor. The resources used to make artificial trees -- plastic and metal -- have a high extraction cost, and most trees are made in China, meaning they need to be shipped thousands of miles before they reach American shores."
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"Reebok brings New England Patriots running back, Danny Woodhead, to a Modell's to see how recognizable he is selling his new jersey to unknowing customers."
Posted by Chad Orzel at 8:45 AM • 0 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
December 18, 2010
Category: Blogs • Maintenance • Technology
As has been mentioned in countless places over the last few days, Yahoo plans to shut down Delicious, the social bookmark service that lots of people use for lots of things. My interest in it is pretty narrow, but important for this blog: I use Delicious to generate the quasi-automatic daily Links Dump postings here. As I surf around during the odd free moment, I tag pages that strike me as interesting, and every morning, Delicious generates a blog post that I then copy and publish here.
I really like this feature, because it gives me a way to acknowledge the dozens of interesting things I run across, but don't feel strongly enough about to generate a whole post. It also lets me post these with very little effort, which helps with my general efficiency.
So, I am going to need a replacement for this, and I don't know enough about the other bookmark services out there to know which of them, if any, can do something similar. That's what the Internet is for, though. So: What should I be looking at as a replacement for Delicious? Please keep in mind that I am only interested in it for generating quasi-automatic Links Dump postings. I don't care about the many other features Delicious offered-- sharing, searching, tagging, whatever-- just the automatic blog posting.
Somebody out there must have a service that does something similar. If you know of it, please point me to it. If one doesn't exist, but you know how to make such a thing, please consider this a request to do so.
Posted by Chad Orzel at 10:11 AM • 5 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Links Dump
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"Winning the Nobel prize aged just 39 could easily have gone to the head of Eric Cornell, the physicist who shared the 2001 prize for creating the world's first Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC). But when Physics World reporter, James Dacey, caught up with Cornell he encountered a firmly grounded experimentalist who can immediately spot the danger of complacency. In a wide-ranging discussion Cornell describes the speed at which his discovery was accepted by the community, his latest research project, and his unease with the responsibility that accompanies his Nobel medal."
Posted by Chad Orzel at 8:14 AM • 0 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
December 17, 2010
Category: Personal
I sprained my ankle yesterday. That's not an official medical diagnosis-- I have a doctor appointment later today to get that-- but I've done this before, and I know the feeling.
Sadly, I did not injure myself saving orphans from a burning building (as I usually do on Thursdays), or while dunking a depleted-uranium basketball through a flaming hoop into the face of a Yeti (because how cool would that be?), but by stepping off our front porch in the wrong place while carrying stuff out to the trash. I'm not sure, but I think the stupidity of the injury actually makes it hurt more-- somebody should do some medical research into this, though I'd hate to be part of that randomly controlled study.
As I lack access to NFL-quality training and rehab facilities, this means I'm going to be limping for a while yet. And spending most of todayon the couch with my foot propped up, and possibly wrapped in ice. This will necessarily cut down on my blog-related program activities.
To pass the time, consider this a Stupid Injury Open Thread: What's the most embarrassingly stupid injury you have ever suffered? Or, at least, the most embarrassingly stupid injury you're willing to admit to in the comments of a blog.
Posted by Chad Orzel at 10:22 AM • 29 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category:
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"Let me end this post with a request: I want all of my readers to visit the YouCut page, and propose that quantum computing and theoretical computer science research be completely eliminated. Here's my own CAREER Award; go ahead and cite it by number as a particularly egregious example of government waste.
See, I'm hungry for the honor (not to mention the free publicity) of seeing my own favorite research topics attacked on the floor of the House. As we all know, it's child's play to make fun of theoretical computer science: its abstruseness, its obvious irrelevance to national goals--however infinitesimal the cost is compared to (say) corn subsidies or defense contracts for stuff the military doesn't want, however gargantuan the payoffs have been in the past. So what are Eric Cantor and Adrian Smith waiting for? I dare them to do it!"
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The headline's about as accurate as most of those touting successes...
Posted by Chad Orzel at 8:12 AM • 0 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
December 16, 2010
Category: Personal • Pictures • Steelykid!
SteelyKid has started to demonstrate a real flair for decoration, which she proudly shows off here:
That's Appa decked out with the three bead necklaces we have for SteelyKid to play with. She tends to take the longest one, the white beads, and wrap it behind her so she has one loop over each arm. She refers to this as her "backpack," and we have a few pictures of her dressed up like this. tonight, She decided Appa needed the backpack which didn't work out so well, given the disparity in size. So he got the smallest (red) necklace as a belt/ backpack thing, and the other two wrapped around his horns because, well, why not?
Posted by Chad Orzel at 7:29 PM • 1 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Journalism • Personal • Pictures • Pop Culture • Silliness • Steelykid!
I'm very pleased to announce that the Uncertain Principles Person of the Year for 2010 is... SteelyKid:
Why do I say this? Well...
First, as lots of people will tell you, we're all citizen journalists now. Which means that I'm every bit as entitled to declare a person of the year as Time magazine is.
Second, everything in Chateau Steelypips revolves around her, so she is clearly the most important and influential person here.
Third, she's way cuter than Mark Zuckerberg. Granted, I don't have a picture of Mark Zuckerberg wearing a napkin as a hat for direct comparison, but I like my odds on this one.
Now, you may be saying that this is just a transparent and silly excuse for posting another ridiculously cute toddler picture, and that she hasn't really done anything to shape the wider world in the way that Zuckerberg's invention of Facebook has. My reply to this is a simple question: What would you rather see turn up on your computer, a cute picture of SteelyKid, or yet another stupid Farmville invitation?
I rest my case.
Posted by Chad Orzel at 9:51 AM • 5 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Links Dump
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Pretty pictures, plus science.
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A map filled in with the first result from Google's auto-complete. Don't read the comments.
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"Described in our archive catalogue as "verses on the contents of 14 collections of papers", and dated to approximately 1690, this charming little poem describes an eclectic collection of material in surprisingly modern terms."
Posted by Chad Orzel at 7:46 AM • 0 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
December 15, 2010
Category: Atoms and Molecules • Optics • Physics • Quantum Optics • Science
I've mentioned before that I'm answering the occasional question over at the Physics Stack Exchange site, a crowd-sourced physics Q&A. When I'm particularly pleased with a question and answer, I'll be promoting them over here like, well, now. Yesterday, somebody posted this question:
Consider a single photon (λ=532 nm) traveling through a plate of perfect glass with a refractive index n=1.5. We know that it does not change its direction or other characteristics in any particular way and propagating 1 cm through such glass is equivalent to 1.5 cm of vacuum. Apparently, the photon interacts with glass, but what is the physical nature of this interaction?
I didn't have a ready answer for this one, but I'm pretty happy with what I came up with on the spot, so I'll expand on it a little bit here. I think it's an interesting question not only because the issues are a little bit subtle, but because it also shows the importance of understanding classical models as well as quantum ones. The key to understanding what's going on here in the quantum scenario is to recognize that the end result is the same as in the classical case, and adapt the classical method accordingly.
So, how do you explain this classically, that is, in a model where light is strictly a wave, and does not have particle character? The answer is, basically, Huygens's Principle.
Read on »
Posted by Chad Orzel at 10:56 AM • 32 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
