The National Academy of Sciences has a survey they’d like people to fill out to help them figure out what kinds of educational materials about science, engineering, and medicine they should publish in print and on the web.
I just took it, and can assure you it’s quick and painless. And along the way they pointed me to some pdf’s that look helpful.
Update: In case my linking above wasn’t clear, here’s the survey.
Originally published December 19, 2008. Copyright 2008 Carl Zimmer.
Attention, lovers of science: clear your 2009 calendar.
The Coalition On The Public Understanding of Science (COPUS), a grassroots network, is putting together a massive celebration of science stretching across all 12 months of the year. Museums, scientific societies, and other groups will be presenting lectures, science cafes, special blogs, exhibits, and the occasional Banana Slug String Band concert. Every month will have a theme, from evolution (February, the month of Darwin’s birthday) to astronomy (July, in celebration of the 400th anniversary of the summer Galileo first trained his telescope to the sky). And if you want to join the happening, COPUS wants to hear from you.
Discover, December 19, 2008
Whenever I lose my watch, I take my sweet time to get a new one. I savor the freedom from my compulsion to carve my days into minute-size fragments. But my liberty has its limits. Even if I get rid of the clock strapped to my wrist, I cannot escape the one in my head. The human brain keeps time, from the flicker of milliseconds to the languorous unfurling of hours and days and years. It’s the product of hundreds of millions of years of evolution.
Keeping track of time is essential for perceiving what’s happening around us and responding to it. In order to tell where a voice is coming from, we time how long it takes for the sound to reach both ears. And when we respond to the voice by speaking ourselves, we need precise timing to make ourselves understood.
Jimmy writes, “This is a picture of my recent ink in commemoration of getting my Ph.D in Molecular Pharmacology. Occam’s Razor in its original Latin text —Numquam ponenda est pluralitas sine necessitate–roughly translated, plurality should never be posited without necessity. I’ve always subscribed to this fundamental tenet behind the scientific method not only in my passion for science, but also in my beliefs in philosophy and religion.”
Click here to go to the full Science Tattoo Emporium.
Originally published December 19, 2008. Copyright 2008 Carl Zimmer.
In the words of my kids: Wahoo!
I grabbed this image from Seed Magazine’s site, showing Microcosm with a few of the other picks, because I love how E. coli is sandwiched between life in the universe and humans. Seems like the right place for it to be.
PS: Amazon can still get you a copy for Xmas!
Originally published December 18, 2008. Copyright 2008 Carl Zimmer.