Last year I took part in a talk about biology, terrorism, and art during the World Science Festival. One of the best things about the experience was getting to talk with people before and after the actual event. The crowd was loaded with artists (for example, the wonderful photographer Justine Cooper) giving serious, interesting thought to how we think about science, and how science changes how we think about the natural world.
Fifteen years ago I got my first vision of the future: a pair of black holes, ringed by rainbows of fire, crashed into each other so violently they sent a tsunami through the fabric of space itself.
The vision did not come from angels or mushrooms. I was sitting at my desk, looking at the saucer-sized screen of a MacIIsi. I was not gazing at actual black holes, but a two-dimensional simulation. And it was not the simulation that astonished me. I was stunned instead by the fact that my Mac was communicating with another computer 800 miles away.
Last summer I had a great time revisiting my geek childhood by watching old episodes of Carl Sagan’s Cosmos on iTunes. As I blogged here, it may be as badly dated as a disco ball, but it’s still wonderfully captivating to my twenty-first century daughters.
Well, if you didn’t fork over $1.99 per episode then, here’s a new recession-era deal you can’t refuse. Cosmos is now on Hulu. Here’s episode one…
Originally published March 24, 2009. Copyright 2009 Carl Zimmer.
Chris Mooney (the subject of a Loom post over the weekend) and Sheril Kirshenbaum have brought their blog, The Intersection, to Discover. I think I’ve been reading the Intersection ever since it started, years ago. Mooney and Kirshenbaum focus on the intersection (hence the name) of science and culture in all its manifestations, from scientific literacy to the way science gets treated by the government. Even when I’ve disagreed with them, I’ve found them thought-provoking. So be sure to check them out.
Originally published March 24, 2009. Copyright 2009 Carl Zimmer.
A meteorologist who asked to remain anonymous writes:
This tattoo is of a cumulonimbus (thunderstorm) cloud with bolts of lightning. My childhood fascination with weather led to a career in it. Storms are embedded in my psyche & soul, and during a stormy time in my life I decided to embed a storm in my skin. I sketched a cumulonimbus cloud for the tattoo artist, and he and the other people in the parlor said something along the lines of, “Dude, we can make that tubular!” and this is how it turned out. It retained meteorological accuracy via the bit of an “anvil” in the upper right and is comparable in structure to the storm in this photo , but without any color. That’s fitting since it represents personal storms as well as atmospheric ones, but perhaps someday I’ll get another tattoo that’s not so dark, to represent brighter days.
Click here to go to the full Science Tattoo Emporium.
(With apologies to Mr. Zimmerman )
Originally published March 22, 2009. Copyright 2009 Carl Zimmer.