You may remember that about this time last year, there was a big hullabaloo because a research group from Harvard claimed that they had discovered primordial gravitational waves using BICEP2, their telescope in the South Pole. This was very exciting because, if true, the result would be extremely good evidence for a model of the early universe called cosmic inflation. (Cosmic inflation is mostly accepted by the scientific community, but it has some philosophical problems and is thus still a little bit controversial. The BICEP2 results would have ended the controversy once and for all.) Even better, the precise
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Hiatus
Hi everyone. You probably haven’t heard from me in a while. This is because I have been completely overwhelmed by class work this semester, which has prevented me from doing the things I want to do, like blogging and doing my own research. For the time being, I don’t think I can expect myself to blog every week, or even every other week. So I’m putting the blog on hold until the semester ends (which should be around the holidays). As always, thanks for reading, everybody.
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Moving (again)
For (hopefully) the last time in the next three years, I’m moving! It’s only one city over, but I want to try and keep up a semblance of work productivity while I pack up and hop. So for the next two weeks or so, the blog will be on hiatus. Sorry all! I will try to put up some fun content sporadically. And hopefully a guest post.
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Post Delayed
This week I’m in Savannah Georgia for the April APS meeting. So far, it’s been a blast! I met fellow blogger +Hamilton Carter, who writes at Copasetic Flow. If you’re interested in relativity or the history of physics, you should definitely check it out. He had a very nice talk on the history of special relativity, and he blogged about it here. And next week, I’ll be taking an exam. So for the next two weeks there may be no posts. To tide you over, I’ll put up a guest post by my good friend Michael Schmidt soon.
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Hiatus
Unfortunately I will be taking a hiatus on blog posts until mid December. The reason is that graduate school is pretty hectic at the moment and I’m feeling a bit too overwhelmed. See you all in about three weeks!
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Moving
Sorry everyone. No new post this week. I meant to get it up late Sunday, but I never managed. I’m currently busy moving out of my old apartment. The lease ends this Friday and I’m kind of in a rush because of this. Normal posts resume next week.
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Kiera Wilmot Charges Dropped
A little while back, I posted about Kiera Wilmot, a student who was expelled for performing a science experiment on school grounds. Worse, Ms. Wilmot faced felony charges. I also posted about what you can do to help her. Good news! Our efforts payed off! All charges against Kiera Wilmot have been dropped! Unfortunately, Ms. Wilmot’s future in the school system is still uncertain. However, at least some of the injustice has been remedied. I got my information here.Thanks very much to Dan Satterfield for pointing it out!
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An Update on Kiera Wilmot
I recently posted about the plight of a teenager in Florida, Kiera Wilmot, who performed a science experiment which went badly. No one was hurt and no property was damaged, but she’s been expelled and she’s facing felony charges. The case has been getting a lot of media attention, which is a really good thing, I think. Here’s some more reading material if you’re interested. DNLee has posted twice on the issue on her Scientific American blog. Both posts are eloquent, enraged, and worth reading. You can find them here and here. There’s also some discussion about what caused
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Social Activism Time
I usually don’t get preachy on this blog. However, there have been two events in the science world that have made me really angry, and I want to do something about it. The first is this: The National Science Foundation (NSF) is the United States government’s premier science organization. Until the sequester, they provided a huge amount of funding for scientific research in every field. Project proposals are subjected to peer review and either funded or rejected based on their scientific merit. The benefit that the United States, both as a political entity and as a society, has
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Beware Water And Laptops
So I missed my promised deadline for my late post this week. I’m sorry about that, everyone. I spilled water on my computer last night and was thus unable to type anything. The computer came out fine, fortunately. I immediately turned it off, unplugged it, and took out the battery. Then I wiped everywhere I could reach dry and turned it over and let a fan blow warm air on the keyboard overnight. Runs fine now. If I’d waited to turn the computer off, though, something might have shorted. Unfortunately, I’m now really busy with the week’s classwork. I