Here’s a lecture Steven Johnson gave last night at Columbia about the future of text. (Steven has a transcript here.) Lo and behold, that degree in semiotics twenty years ago makes a lot of sense now!
[Update: I embedded the video here this morning, but it starts on its own, and sometimes it shows a lecture by someone else. Future of journalism, indeed–c’mon, Columbia! Here’s the place where I think you can find the video.]
Originally published April 23, 2010. Copyright 2010 Carl Zimmer.
I didn’t know Oliver Wendell Holmes thought the odors of boxwoods “carry us out of time into the abysses of the unbeginning past.” I didn’t know that the necks of daffodils bulge when their ova are fertilized. At least, I didn’t know such things before my wife Grace started to garden, and then to chronicle her experiences in a new blog . I think it’s delightful, but don’t take my spousal word for it–check it out!
Originally published April 22, 2010. Copyright 2010 Carl Zimmer.
Attention, people of Yale, New Haven, and environs! I will be giving a talk Friday called “Science and the Media: A Match Made in Heaven, or a Cosmic Train Wreck?”
I’ll offer my bipolar musings on the once and future state of science journalism. It’s free and open to the public
It’s sponsored by the Yale Training Program in Biophysics, the Department of Molecular Biology and Biophysics, and the Poynter Fellowship in Journalism at Yale.
Here are the details:
When: Friday, April 23, 2010 4:00 PM
Where: Bass Center for Molecular and Structural Biology (BASS), Rm. 305
266 Whitney Ave., New Haven, CT 06511
More information here. and here.
Originally published April 21, 2010. Copyright 2010 Carl Zimmer.
In my lastest podcast, I talk to Keith Klugman of Emory University about pneumonia–how its devastation worldwide is worse than we once thought, and how vaccines are proving surprisingly effective at keeping it in check. A pneumonia vaccine may even prevent a replay of the 50 million deaths during the 1918 Spanish flu pandemic. Check it out.
Originally published April 21, 2010. Copyright 2010 Carl Zimmer.
Some weird results on potential Neanderthal interbreeding are coming out. Nature News has a write-up. Hat tip, Vaughan Bell.
Originally published April 20, 2010. Copyright 2010 Carl Zimmer.