And that’s all I have to say today! (Well, probably.)
The Case of the Disappearing Teaspoons
In the British Medical Journal, reported by Science Blog, results of fascinating and vital research from the Burnet Institute in Australia on the well-known yet baffling phenomenon of tea (and, by extension, coffee) spoons disappearing in the workplace. Some results: During the study, 56 (80%) of the 70 teaspoons disappeared. The half life of the …
A "Huh?" for Wired News
Wired News‘s top science story of 2005 is global warming. Fair enough, but the first sentence of their paragraph describing it brought me up short: “1. It’s getting hot in here: Thanks to the Asian tsunami and Hurricane Katrina, global warming can no longer be ignored.” The linking of global warming to Katrina is just …
What brings people to my website?
From Sitemeter, here are the top search terms that bring people to my main website, Edward Willett’s Intergalactic Library (out of the last 4,000 visits, which is probably eight to 10 days’ worth): No. ofvisits………….Search term131…………….hamoukar42……………..riedel glasses37……………..rogue waves35……………..christmas physics34……………..pheremones31……………..riedel wine glasses29……………..christmas chemistry26……………..christmas questions22……………..hygiene hypothesis19……………..edmund scientific17……………..physics of football15……………..animal emotions14……………..riedel glass13……………..skycar13……………..golf technology12……………..skunks12……………..art restoration12……………..animal intelligence That high-ranking placement …
The Great White Way lives!
It was a boffo year for Broadway.
A P.D.Q. Bach "Retrogressive"
The music of P.D.Q. Bach, the last (and least) of J. S. Bach’s sons, is being celebrated in a special “Retrogressive” this week at Manhattan’s Symphony Space. The occasion is the 40th anniversary of the first performance of the, alas, entirely fictional composer’s music by Peter Schickele. Says Playbill Arts: “Shickele who is also known …
The Great Wall of MIT
They’re experimenting at MIT with a rammed-earth wall–a wall built using the same technology as the Great Wall of China. The hope is that it might be a more environmentally friendly way to build certain structures today than concrete. So far, after two months, the wall is holding up well.
The sad state of self-assessment
Thinking about New Year’s resolutions this year? If you think you don’t need to make a resolution because you’re already wonderful—well, science says, you’re probably wrong. Human beings, it seems, are notoriously incompetent at self-assessment. In the December issue of Scientific American Mind, David Dunning, professor of psychology at Cornell University, Chip Heath, professor of …
Popular in Norway again?
All of a sudden, I’m getting all kinds of visits from the ntnu.no domain, which belongs to the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU) in Trondheim. The last time this happened was when I was posting lots of pictures of Banff. I have no idea why it happened then, or why it’s happening now. …
Merry Christmas!
That’s all I have to say today.
The power of Harry Potter
When a new book in the series comes out, children’s traumatic injury rates fall. Magic!
The first sentence I wrote today was…
The first sentence of the first chapter of this book stated, “Engineers—and engineering projects—were few and far between on the prairies in the years before Saskatchewan’s birth as a province.” Yes, I’m summing up–which means I’m on the last chapter! I’m on the last chapter! I’M ON THE LAST CHAPTER! Ahem. Sorry, I got a …
My latest live walk and vlog
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