we went to the science center for Star Wars Identities
I took some photos of the Van De Graaff generator in action
"Given the data, they concluded that social scientists could not possibly have picked a worse population from which to draw broad generalizations."
australopithecus?
been a while since I touched osteology
do tell me if I’ve hit the wrong ancestor; the sagittal crest is giving me suspicions
(Source: everyoneeatscookies, via theolduvaigorge)
"Many adults are put off when youngsters pose scientific questions. Children ask why the sun is yellow, or what a dream is, or how deep you can dig a hole, or when is the world’s birthday, or why we have toes. Too many teachers and parents answer with irritation or ridicule, or quickly move on to something else. Why adults should pretend to omniscience before a five-year-old, I can’t for the life of me understand. What’s wrong with admitting that you don’t know? Children soon recognize that somehow this kind of question annoys many adults. A few more experiences like this, and another child has been lost to science. There are many better responses. If we have an idea of the answer, we could try to explain. If we don’t, we could go to the encyclopedia or the library. Or we might say to the child: “I don’t know the answer. Maybe no one knows. Maybe when you grow up, you’ll be the first to find out."
(Source: skaterboytae, via floatingwalrus)
December 10, 1815: Ada Lovelace is born.
Today’s Google Doodle honors Ada Lovelace, Lord Byron’s only legitimate child and the woman who is popularly credited as “the world’s first computer programmer”. Lady Byron, who separated from Ada’s father just a month after she was born, sought to raise her daughter in a manner that ensured she would not end up like her volatile poet father. Ada, often ill as a child, began studying mathematics at a young age and soon discovered her natural flair for the subject, so strong that one of her tutors, Augustus De Morgan, suggested that she become a mathematician “of first-rate eminence” later in life. In 1833, Ada attempted to elope with another one of her tutors, although her attempt failed, and the entire incident was covered up.
That year, she also met Charles Babbage, a mathematician and inventor with whom Ada shared a close correspondence for the rest of her life. Over a nine-month-long period in 1842 and 1843, Ada translated an Italian memoir regarding Babbage’s Analytical Engine; she supplemented her translation with her own set of notes (which actually ended up longer than the memoir itself) explaining in detail the differences between Babbage’s machine and his Difference Engine. Ada was optimistic about the future of these engines and machines. Although a mathematician, she was not limited by numbers and predicted that someday a more complex descendant of Babbage’s engines “might act upon other things besides number… the Engine might compose elaborate and scientific pieces of music of any degree of complexity or extent”. She also provided what is today recognized as “the world’s first computer program” - a proposed algorithm that would generate Bernoulli numbers using the analytical machine. Whether Ada formulated the plan herself, or whether it was the product of close collaboration between herself, Babbage, and associates, or whether it was someone else’s work entirely, remains subject to debate to this day. Babbage, at least, was as impressed by Ada as she was by him; in 1843 he wrote of her:
Forget this world and all its troubles and if
possible its multitudinous Charlatans – every thing
in short but the Enchantress of Numbers.
(via hanalyze)
Happy Birthday Bill Nye the Science Guy!
“Everyone you will ever meet knows something you don’t.” ― Bill Nye
Oh the lessons I’ve learned from this wonderful person! It is our honor here at Scinerds to give a warm Happy bday post to one of our beloved heroes of science, the science guy! May he continue to educate the masses so successfully as he has always done.
William Sanford “Bill” Nye (born November 27, 1955), popularly known as Bill Nye the Science Guy, is an American science educator, comedian, television host, actor, mechanical engineer, writer, and scientist. He is best known as the host of the Disney/PBS children’s science show Bill Nye the Science Guy (1993–98) and for his many subsequent appearances in popular media as a science educator.
(via floatingwalrus)
Today over on Twitter I presented many facts about owls. I hope you find them informative.
Today, in things we never expected to be posting to this blog as serious technology: The Warp Drive.
Apparently, scientists at NASA have developed a mathematical model showing that true warp drive may be possible using practical amounts of energy.
This would make it possible to get to the star system closest to Earth in about 5 months.
Amazing. Now, they must test it in the lab.
space space space space
space space sapce sapce scpa es fgSSCCCIIENCEEEEEEE
now they must test it in a lab
dvdp:
this has to be here.
first views from NASA’s Curiosity rover, which landed on Mars the evening of Aug. 5 PDT. It was taken through a “fisheye” wide-angle lens on one of the rover’s Hazard-Avoidance cameras. These engineering cameras are located at the rover’s base. As planned, the early images are lower resolution.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
15 Misconceptions About Evolution
I don’t think these will surprise any of my followers but it’s always nice to have a refresher
15. Evolution is a theory about the origin of lifeThe theory of evolution primarily deals with the manner in which life has changed after its origin. While science is interested in the origins of life (for example the composition of the primeval sludge from which life might have come) but these are not issues covered in the area of evolution. What is known is that regardless of the start, at some point life began to branch off. Evolution is, therefore, dedicated to the study of those processes.
14. Organisms are always getting betterWhile it is a fact that natural selection weeds out unhealthy genes from the gene pool, there are many cases where an imperfect organism has survived. Some examples of this are fungi, sharks, crayfish, and mosses – these have all remained essentially the same over a great period of time. These organisms are all sufficiently adapted to their environment to survive without improvement.
Other taxa have changed a lot, but not necessarily for the better. Some creatures have had their environments changed and their adaptations may not be as well suited to their new situation. Fitness is linked to their environment, not to progress.
(Source: facebook.com, via selfesteampunk)
Science Picture of the Day: The Mars Horizon
NASA’s Mars Rover Opportunity captured this image looking eastward over the Endeavour Crater late in the afternoon of Opportunity’s 2,888th Martian sol (day) which corresponded with March 9, 2012 here on Earth. In the foreground, Opportunity’s own shadow appears, in a sort of one-step-removed self-portrait. […] The image is a mosaic of about a dozen images and presented in false color to draw out certain features of the topography.
[Image: NASA]
