Point taken and you're correct. It was not my intent to say that you can't gain on the job experience, that's perfectly legitimate.
What concerns me are the people that come from way out in left field. Maybe they've read a book or two or in this particular case they've watched some "educational" tv, and suddenly they're giving advice or (even worse) portraying themselves as something they aren't. That doesn't mean that these people don't have anything to contribute, nor that their opinions have no value, you just don't want to rely on what they say without checking it out, just as the professionals checked your code. Very often there are complexities or complications that a novice simply will not know about and that can be where they get into big trouble (or make the next big discovery if they are really lucky).
The quote from the article "the Internet undermined anyone whose status depended on a privileged access to information" is quite profound. If a 15 year old can provide the same answers as a laywer, what's the difference?
I agree that universal access to information is
possibly the most significant contribution of the internet. However, what concerns me greatly as an
educator is that having access to information doesn't necessarily mean that you have the skills, the experience, or the maturity to apply it properly. I have worked with a couple of high school students, as bright as they come, but almost weekly they come in with some tidbit that they pulled off the internet that is dubious at best or downright dangerous at worst (not necessarily because the information is wrong, although sometimes it is, other times it's just incomplete), and these kids just don't know any better, and how could they?
So I guess what I'm saying here is that information can take you far, but I wouldn't hire an engineer to build a bridge or go to a surgeon that claimed they learned everything they needed to know off of a website or on tv.
Having access to information is great and I believe it's a good thing, but we have to be teaching people (not just kids) how to use that information responsibly so they don't hurt themselves or others.
If you're talking about stellar atmospheres, then yes, astronomers assume that all the oxygen gets bound up in carbon, unless you're talking about S type stars (low carbon abundance stars) then the
oxygen gets bound up in metal-oxides and you start seeing strange things like zirconium-oxide or titanium-oxide.
However, outside of a stellar atmosphere, you can easily form other molecules containing oxygen, and since hydrogen is the most abundant element, water is going to be formed in reasonably large quantities.
As for dying stars being able to melt comets when their main sequence progenitors could not... This is not a surprising result. When a star enters the red giant phase, the outer layers of the star may cool off, but the luminosity (the power output) of the star goes way up (think Betelgeuse). Even if the outer portion of the star is cooler, it's still going to be warm enough to melt ice!
Finally, I'm not sure what the big deal about all this is anyway. Astronomers have been observing H2O masers around red giants and star forming regions for years. We've known for a long time that water is out there...
Um... You seem to be a little mis-informed. An optical search has a much smaller chance of success than a radio search, for several reasons.
1. Our own optical detectors have a pretty limited duty cycle (meaning that high frequency light pulses would be next to impossible to detect...). On the other hand, our RF technology
is capable of detecting some pretty weak signals at high frequency. It's much easier to build an array of large radio telescopes with greater signal gathering power that can work together than it is to build an optical counterpart, optical interferometry is still in its infancy.
2. Interstellar extinction in the optical can be large enough to mask an entire star, so missing
an optical signal would be real easy. This is not as big of a problem in the radio.
3. It's much easier to generate a powerful radio signal than it is a bright light pulse.
That's just a few reasons, and if I thought about it, I could probably come up with a few more reasons why optical is less likely. There was a guy on here recently trying to make the case that optical was better, but I really didn't find his arguments convincing, and I don't think the scientific comunity in general has really bought into it either. I have yet to hear of anyone getting time on a big telescope to try this out yet.
But you forget that sumbolism often cannot be interpreted outside of a certain clultural context, and if you are not familiar with the context no amount of brightness will make up for it. Say, if you are trying to understand 2001 but nave never heard of Nietzsche, you might be able to come up with some personal interpretation, but in all likelihood it will have little to do with the film.
I agree with you there, at least up to a point. If you haven't heard of Neitzsche you won't pick up on that, but on the other hand, I think someone who *hadn't* heard of Neitzsche might come up with an even more interesting interpretation, precisely because he hadn't heard of Neitzsche. And I think we can just point at Wheat to show that having a similar cultural background to Kubrik doesn't necessarily mean that you won't come up with stuff that has nothing to do with the film!:)
The point of contention was your statement that since you were bright you could interpret the symbols for yourself. Very bright people have spent their whole lives doing just that and I find that attitude extremely arrogant. Sorry if I misinterpreted your position.
Actually, that *is* the point I was making, but not in quite the way you read it. What I meant by that, is that I (and most people) are bright enough to come up with our own ideas about what the symbolism means, and that the personal meaning found is more important and more personally enriching than trying to make sure that what you see is the same thing as some random guy, that managed to get a book published on the subject. Now I don't think there's anything wrong with publishing a book about this, but the tone of the author's response really sounds like he's trying to create "the definitive" interpretation, and I really have to take issue with that. In doing so, he invalidates the thoughts that anyone else might have about it for the sake of his own ego. That may be
reading too much into it, but the tone of his response leads me to believe that.
Which brings me back to what bugs me about
these kinds of analyses to begin with (whether they are valid or not). A good analysis can be just as informative as coming up with your own, but you will always get more out of the experience by coming up with your own ideas. And the plethora of analyses that people write (even the good ones) always seem to miss that point, or leave little room for it.
I agree with you, there are parts of his analysis that are not implausible, and it would probably be
interesting to see someone with better credentials to expand on it, but Wheat just seems to go too far out into left field to be able to pull it off.
Actually the story behind the musical score the movie is rather interesting. Kubrik had hired a composer to do an original score, but in the end decided he didn't like it, and chose to go
with the "stock" track that was inserted in the rough cut of the film. IIRC, a CD was released by the composer (I've forgotten who) containing his compositions for the movie. I thought it might've appeared on the DVD, but it doesn't seem to be (or at least it's not on my copy).
People put a lot of thought and effort into the
headlines of the National Enquirer, but that doesn't mean that it's worthwhile to read (unless you're looking for a laugh).
You seem to be confusing skepticism with arrogance. Nowhere in my post did I claim to be
able to understand everything, in fact, my lack of understanding is why I am so skeptical. All I'm asking for is a reasonably
plausible argument for the conclusions Wheat draws, and what he provides doesn't measure up very well.... For example, the Bowman/Odyssey link isn't that implausible, and I might buy it, except that Clark's own words appear to contradict this. However, 1930's bathroom tiles and scatological references? Come on! He's really reaching there, and as a result he discredits the rest of his treatise which might be more plausible. As things are, it is far more plausible that Discovery had three hexagonal rocket engines because Clark researched it a bit and decided that it made sense from an engineering standpoint than it is to think that they are the result of bathroom tiles. And the reason it's more plausible is that Clark is very well known for trying to make his science fiction conform to current scientific theories. Now, do you see begin to see my problem with this? The simple fact is that there are several far more plausible explanations for why the movie was made the way it was which makes Wheat's writing sound like it came while under the influence of some possibly illegal substance. If Wheat wants me to buy into his analysis, he's going to have to do a much better job backing it up, and it's certainly not arrogant of me to call him on it. I keep and open mind, but it's not so open that my brains fall out.... And if that's hubris, then I guess I'm guilty.
I think you're reading a little too much into what
I said. I'll admit I'm not an expert on deconstructionist thought (and perhaps I'm not using the term properly), but I have
read about the ludicrous extremes it sometimes
goes to. Which is where I was drawing my parallel, not that the book itself is deconstructionist in nature (a miscommunication on my part), but that it draws conclusions that are based on the flimsiest of logic.
Also, I didn't say that I thought a critic's function is to enhance one's experience, in fact,
I said just the opposite. I enjoy a work much more when I'm able to draw my conclusions about it, without the filter.
Now, if you want to talk about using artistic works as a means of understanding the culture that produced it, that's
a totally different thing (at least, to me it is), and I think an analysis on that level would be interesting, but I really don't think Wheat's book comes even remotely close to doing that, or at least I don't think the evidence he presents adaquately supports his assertians, not even by a longshot. As you say, it sounds like numerology.
I have to agree with you here. I get really annoyed by so-called "symbolic" interpretations of artistic works (be they literary, film, or on canvas). Such interpretations always wind up sounding like meaningless deconstructionist pablum.
I have to wonder who these people think they
are? I'm a pretty bright guy, and I can figure stuff out. I don't need some self-appointed, self-important, pseudo-intellectual to tell me how I should think, feel, or interpret a piece of art, I can do that pretty well on my own!
Undoubtedly different people will see different things in a work, because each of us brings different experiences to bear on it. And that's
a good thing! But some guy coming along and
deciding that his interpretation is the one
and only right one is nothing more than someone with an inflated ego trying to make everyone else believe that he is justified in having such a big head. In this case, it's particularly egregious since he just SO wrong!
Give me a break. I have never stolen anything
that the RIAA or the MPAA was willing to sell to
me (and I actually wanted). The flip side though is that there is a lot of music/movies that I would like to have (and would gladly pay for) if
they were made available. For that kind of stuff,
I have no problem downloading it off the net or getting it by another means because it isn't available at all.
My problem with the RIAA and the MPAA (and MS for that matter) does not
stem from them wanting to be compensated for thier
work. My problem comes from them wanting to control every aspect of the usage of their product, including when and where I might choose
to listen to a song or watch a movie that I have already lawfully purchased a license for. They have no business (or right) to make that kind of intrusion into my personal life! The real fight with the MPAA and RIAA is about who's going to control what movies you watch, what music you listen to. Do they get to decide for you, or do
you get to decide for yourself. It's getting very
near to the point now where the only choice is to
either consume what they present to you, or throw out your TV, your stereo, and your computer.
Finally, it's pretty obvious you do not understand what's at the foundations of the open source movement. As a scientist, I am well aware
of the value of being able to look over someone
else's work, and perhaps improve on it. That's
how science works best, and that simple philosophy is what is at the core of the GPL. People like RMS (and I'm not saying I agree with him
100%, but he does make a good case), believe strongly that the best way to advance technology is to do so scientifically, with peer review. The good ideas are kept by consensus and the bad ideas are thrown out and technology advances. That process breaks down when companies like MS decide that they know what's best for everyone and then
hide behind IP laws to avoid judgement about their
ideas. Not to mention that I think MS (and the MPAA and RIAA) are just power hungry bastards more interested in maximizing profits than advancing technology and making everyone's lives better (which is something that a corporate charter is supposed to address before approval, if I'm not mistaken).
A year ago I was part of a panel discussion about
technology in education and this very issue came up. The consensus was that this should be turned into an opportunity to teach critical thinking skills. With all the junk that's out there, it is very important to be able to tell the difference between good materials and some random AOL user's
UFO abduction story...and it's pretty easy to come up with examples to compare and contrast, the very thing you need to make it work.
I think the internet provides the perfect opportunity to teach these skills, but the teachers have to be well versed in the technology themselves before it can be used effectively, and most teachers don't have the training yet.
Well, simply put, there are number of very important skills we should be teaching students that are not easily tested on a multiple guess exam. Critical thinking skills, application of
known skills to unfamiliar problems, experimentation.
The extreme example of these are the Japanese
Jukart (sp?) schools, the test drilling schools. While in grad. school I encountered several japanese grad students who attended those schools, and who had absolutely amazing physics gre scores. But in the end they had a very hard time making it, because they had only been taught how to take tests, but not how to apply any of their schooling in real world situations.
So how do you change things? Well, don't eliminate the tests, tests should be given, but
should not be relied upon to give the complete picture of a student's achievement. The problem
is that other methods (student observations, interviews) have a tendancy to be subjective and
much more expensive to administer. I admit I don't know what the solution is, but I do know that going down the path of using standardized tests
as the only measure of a student's potential is a really stupid idea.
Frankly, I find your rationalizing of the Republican response to be pretty disgusting.
And you really are rationalizing, unlawful recounts? Especially when certain Bush campaign
insiders came out and said that they had
similar plans ready to go if the reverse had happened? They were every bit as ready to start calling for your so called, unlawful recounts,
as the Gore campaign was.
What kills me is that you can tell me with a
straight face (at least I think you're being serious) that I should be concerned about which
party is more consistently corrupt. As though some amount of corruption is acceptible (if not unexpected)! You've just
given me yet another reason why I cannot stand to
identify myself with either party! Both parties
should be severely weakened, and a few very small
changes in the electoral system is all it would take. But we both know that both parties are so
consistantly corrupt, that it probably will never
happen.
When 30-40% of urban children can't read, it's a severe problem. You don't put your head in the sand and say "Gee, it's not that bad!"
Reread my post. Did I not say there were areas
that could not use a lot of improvement? Did
I not say there were areas where local social mores were such that education was not deemed important? Again, we need to examine what we are doing very closely, especially when there are a number of places in this country where our kids are scoring at the top of the TIMSS study and not at the bottom (in spite of what the sky is falling media say). I did not say that the troubles in inner city schools were not severe, but to go in and muck with the entire system just because we have a problem in inner city schools is
throwing the baby out with the bath water. We must look at the problem much more granularly than
trying the "one size fits all" approach.
Yes, I have heard of Educational Alternatives, Inc. I am also aware of a couple of others, to my
knowledge none of these companies has had the kind
of success that would warrant my support.
Finally, I know a number of math and science education researchers that will tell you that teaching math for a test severely short changes the student. Being able to add, subtract, multiply, and divide is a very important to math and science, and are easily tested on an exam. But is that all that kids should know? What about the ability to apply those skills in a new situation? How do you test that? How do you test critical thinking
skills on a multiple choice test? How do you test
inquiry learning on a multiple choice test? And
how about this one: How do you instill a love of
learning in a child if all you do is teach to a test? You are wrong, it is a complicated concept.
Learning is complicated, if it were simple, everyone would be doing great, and there would be
no reason to have this exchange.
A simplistic exam is a quick fix and a cop out that will only give schools that do well bragging rights, allow GWB to give a few warm and fuzzy speeches, while children in poor schools will continue to be short-changed.
1. You should really stop listening to news media rhetoric concerning our educational system. It is not nearly as bad as some would have you believe. (Look up a few articles written by David Berliner). That's not to say that there isn't room for improvement (and in some states there is a lot of room), but I can say with some certainty, that the current plans probably won't work, because...
2. I have seen some of these "high stakes" exams. Yes, these test are the start of something amazing...something amazingly stupid. The math portion of Arizona's exam, is
especially bad. You can't very well reward (or discredit) a school based on the test scores from exams such as these.
Not to mention the potential damage to students
intellectual development if the end result of
this "amazing change" is that we only teach our
students to pass the tests (see some of the criticisms about the Japanese jukart (sp?) schools.). Dubya's comments that students who
can pass an exam have learned something are very dubious in nature.
3. It is completely unfathomable to me where some people get off thinking that because the free enterprise system works for economics that it will work in areas that have little or nothing to do with business. I ask you this: Who are these
wonderful educational entreprenuers that are going into inner city schools when the public schools close because none of them are any good? And let's not forget that in some circles, being educated (even graduating from high school) is not considered something worth striving for....in other words, there are societal issues that have to be addressed, and no amount of money thrown at an educational system will improve it, if the local social structure does not deem education a worthy goal.
That said, I am not against educational reform, but we need to take a lot harder look at what we are doing wrong and what we are doing right in a much more measured fashion than leaving the education of our children open to a "free market" of exams that tell us our students can pass a test, but tell us nothing about whether or not we are training people who can think critically, reason intelligently, and express themselves coherently.
Sorry, but if logic really were an important part of US party politics, there would
be a lot more intelligent debate and lot less
manipulative rhetoric. The R's are just as guilty
of it as the D's.
You attack the Dem's for their
unscrupulous behavior (and I agree, it was simply awful) but you forget how poorly,
the Rep's behaved. There is a long standing tradition of manual recounts, not just here, but
around the world, and it's generally supported by
republicans everywhere, unless it's in the middle
of a close election in Florida.
And you're telling me that Bush's aid to faith
based institutions program is based on logic and not warm and fuzzy feelings? When many of the most prominant leaders of the same institutions
are advising against taking monies from this program should they become available (and they give very good reasons for why this is such a bad idea)?
I know you want to feel that, since you identify yourself as conservative, that conservatism stands on superior intellectual ground, but I sure don't see it. I've noticed that "liberals" and "conservatives" often employ their own brands of logic when it suits them, and occaisionally they even get close to the real thing. But, when push comes
to shove there are few things either of the big two parties won't stoop to, to get elected, and the first casualty of such actions is always logic and the truth, in favor of the manipulation of their
constituancies, and the demonizing their opponents.
What really bothers me about this exchange and
most of what's going on throughout this entire
story, is that we've got a whole bunch of people
polarized between two extremes.
Frankly, I don't trust big business anymore than I trust big government. They both make me
extremely nervous, and there's nothing that anybody promoting either position can say to alay
those fears. It would probably be extremely instructive for you if thought about why that might be.
Business can be a force for good, and the government can be a force for good as well. The
problem is that they can just as easily do harm. And until more people come to grips with the fact
neither business nor the government is 100% good nor 100% evil we're going to continue having these
rediculous arguments instead making real progress solving the problems that business and gov't present us.
Remember, the cost of freedom is eternal vigilance. There will always be governments, political/social groups, and businesses that will
always seek to gain power over others. It is our
responsibility to look at the motivations and mechinations of these entities to make sure they
really are on the up and up, and not out to screw
us.
Heh. Yeah, I forgot. I hear that one two!:)
But usually it's amoung the particle physicists.
We astronomers don't tend to have to worry about
electroweak unification unless you're working in
cosmology.
Well, yeah there are 5, but in most physics circles, electricity and magnetism are generally counted as one force. I suppose it's mostly for
historical reasons, since E & M were unified such
a long time ago. Ask most any physicist to list
the known forces and they will almost always
describe them as gravity, electromagnetism, the
strong, and weak atomic forces, hence I called
the new force, a "5th" force. *shrug*
Well, planets don't. On the other hand, some of Saturn's moons are known to be in chaotic orbits (due to the complex interactions between the moons, Saturn and the sun), Saturn as a planet, however doesn't exhibit any anomalies within our observational limits.
You have to be careful with comet orbits too. The gas ejected from
comets when they are near the sun can definitely
change their orbit. Such non-gravitational
accelerations have been observed in nearly every
comet to date.
A few years ago, there was a hullabuloo about
a possible 5th force, but it was never confirmed.
Recent astronomical observations to seem to show
that the cosmological constant may not be zero
implying that there may be a very weak antigravity force, but
it's not really detectable on scales that we can
easily experiment with, and it has yet to really
be confirmed, so for now, the issue remains unresolved.
At large distances, the smaller terms get smaller.
The higher order terms are inversely proportional
to the radius raised to a power (larger than 2), so the larger
the r the smaller the force. Even if you were
to use the full blown field equations (tensors and
all) you're still going to get this drop off.
Things really only get interesting at small
radii and huge gravitational fields...like around
black holes, neutron stars, and perhaps white dwarfs, those are the only places where the higher order terms start to become significant.
In other words, the answer to this mystery does
not lie in general relativity, and more likely than not, has nothing to do with gravity at all...there
would be too many other discrepancies in things
like planetary orbits, if it were, in fact, a problem with our gravitational theories.
You sir, have no clue what you are talking about! This companies' database was built
on the backs of people like myself who freely contributed to it, WITHOUT compensation. You are critical of us for wanting something for nothing, but turn a blind eye to the fact that
the CDDB owners did get something for nothing!
They didn't have to pay a soul to compile all the
CD information, it was given to them, and now they
expect us to pay them to get back the very same data that we contributed for free! I say screw them the same way they have screwed us! It's only fair.
Well, actually you can expect a pretty bright comet to pass through the inner solar system every
ten years or so. Unfortunately, most of the time,
the Earth just isn't really in the best position
to see it. Usually this means having to get up
a couple of hours before sunrise, or catch a few
glimpses after sunset, and then the view is sub-optimal. Hale-Bopp (and Hyakutake as well)
turned out to be nice exceptions.
But you can rest easy, there will be others, maybe
not quite as spectacular as Hale-Bopp, but they are out there. In fact, many people make all kinds of comparisons between H-B and Comet West in
the early 70's.
Slashdot Mirror
What concerns me are the people that come from way out in left field. Maybe they've read a book or two or in this particular case they've watched some "educational" tv, and suddenly they're giving advice or (even worse) portraying themselves as something they aren't. That doesn't mean that these people don't have anything to contribute, nor that their opinions have no value, you just don't want to rely on what they say without checking it out, just as the professionals checked your code. Very often there are complexities or complications that a novice simply will not know about and that can be where they get into big trouble (or make the next big discovery if they are really lucky).
I agree that universal access to information is possibly the most significant contribution of the internet. However, what concerns me greatly as an educator is that having access to information doesn't necessarily mean that you have the skills, the experience, or the maturity to apply it properly. I have worked with a couple of high school students, as bright as they come, but almost weekly they come in with some tidbit that they pulled off the internet that is dubious at best or downright dangerous at worst (not necessarily because the information is wrong, although sometimes it is, other times it's just incomplete), and these kids just don't know any better, and how could they?
So I guess what I'm saying here is that information can take you far, but I wouldn't hire an engineer to build a bridge or go to a surgeon that claimed they learned everything they needed to know off of a website or on tv.
Having access to information is great and I believe it's a good thing, but we have to be teaching people (not just kids) how to use that information responsibly so they don't hurt themselves or others.
However, outside of a stellar atmosphere, you can easily form other molecules containing oxygen, and since hydrogen is the most abundant element, water is going to be formed in reasonably large quantities.
As for dying stars being able to melt comets when their main sequence progenitors could not... This is not a surprising result. When a star enters the red giant phase, the outer layers of the star may cool off, but the luminosity (the power output) of the star goes way up (think Betelgeuse). Even if the outer portion of the star is cooler, it's still going to be warm enough to melt ice!
Finally, I'm not sure what the big deal about all this is anyway. Astronomers have been observing H2O masers around red giants and star forming regions for years. We've known for a long time that water is out there...
1. Our own optical detectors have a pretty limited duty cycle (meaning that high frequency light pulses would be next to impossible to detect...). On the other hand, our RF technology is capable of detecting some pretty weak signals at high frequency. It's much easier to build an array of large radio telescopes with greater signal gathering power that can work together than it is to build an optical counterpart, optical interferometry is still in its infancy.
2. Interstellar extinction in the optical can be large enough to mask an entire star, so missing an optical signal would be real easy. This is not as big of a problem in the radio.
3. It's much easier to generate a powerful radio signal than it is a bright light pulse.
That's just a few reasons, and if I thought about it, I could probably come up with a few more reasons why optical is less likely. There was a guy on here recently trying to make the case that optical was better, but I really didn't find his arguments convincing, and I don't think the scientific comunity in general has really bought into it either. I have yet to hear of anyone getting time on a big telescope to try this out yet.
I agree with you there, at least up to a point. If you haven't heard of Neitzsche you won't pick up on that, but on the other hand, I think someone who *hadn't* heard of Neitzsche might come up with an even more interesting interpretation, precisely because he hadn't heard of Neitzsche. And I think we can just point at Wheat to show that having a similar cultural background to Kubrik doesn't necessarily mean that you won't come up with stuff that has nothing to do with the film! :)
The point of contention was your statement that since you were bright you could interpret the symbols for yourself. Very bright people have spent their whole lives doing just that and I find that attitude extremely arrogant. Sorry if I misinterpreted your position.
Actually, that *is* the point I was making, but not in quite the way you read it. What I meant by that, is that I (and most people) are bright enough to come up with our own ideas about what the symbolism means, and that the personal meaning found is more important and more personally enriching than trying to make sure that what you see is the same thing as some random guy, that managed to get a book published on the subject. Now I don't think there's anything wrong with publishing a book about this, but the tone of the author's response really sounds like he's trying to create "the definitive" interpretation, and I really have to take issue with that. In doing so, he invalidates the thoughts that anyone else might have about it for the sake of his own ego. That may be reading too much into it, but the tone of his response leads me to believe that. Which brings me back to what bugs me about these kinds of analyses to begin with (whether they are valid or not). A good analysis can be just as informative as coming up with your own, but you will always get more out of the experience by coming up with your own ideas. And the plethora of analyses that people write (even the good ones) always seem to miss that point, or leave little room for it.
I agree with you, there are parts of his analysis that are not implausible, and it would probably be interesting to see someone with better credentials to expand on it, but Wheat just seems to go too far out into left field to be able to pull it off.
Actually the story behind the musical score the movie is rather interesting. Kubrik had hired a composer to do an original score, but in the end decided he didn't like it, and chose to go with the "stock" track that was inserted in the rough cut of the film. IIRC, a CD was released by the composer (I've forgotten who) containing his compositions for the movie. I thought it might've appeared on the DVD, but it doesn't seem to be (or at least it's not on my copy).
You seem to be confusing skepticism with arrogance. Nowhere in my post did I claim to be able to understand everything, in fact, my lack of understanding is why I am so skeptical. All I'm asking for is a reasonably plausible argument for the conclusions Wheat draws, and what he provides doesn't measure up very well.... For example, the Bowman/Odyssey link isn't that implausible, and I might buy it, except that Clark's own words appear to contradict this. However, 1930's bathroom tiles and scatological references? Come on! He's really reaching there, and as a result he discredits the rest of his treatise which might be more plausible. As things are, it is far more plausible that Discovery had three hexagonal rocket engines because Clark researched it a bit and decided that it made sense from an engineering standpoint than it is to think that they are the result of bathroom tiles. And the reason it's more plausible is that Clark is very well known for trying to make his science fiction conform to current scientific theories. Now, do you see begin to see my problem with this? The simple fact is that there are several far more plausible explanations for why the movie was made the way it was which makes Wheat's writing sound like it came while under the influence of some possibly illegal substance. If Wheat wants me to buy into his analysis, he's going to have to do a much better job backing it up, and it's certainly not arrogant of me to call him on it. I keep and open mind, but it's not so open that my brains fall out.... And if that's hubris, then I guess I'm guilty.
Also, I didn't say that I thought a critic's function is to enhance one's experience, in fact, I said just the opposite. I enjoy a work much more when I'm able to draw my conclusions about it, without the filter.
Now, if you want to talk about using artistic works as a means of understanding the culture that produced it, that's a totally different thing (at least, to me it is), and I think an analysis on that level would be interesting, but I really don't think Wheat's book comes even remotely close to doing that, or at least I don't think the evidence he presents adaquately supports his assertians, not even by a longshot. As you say, it sounds like numerology.
I have to agree with you here. I get really annoyed by so-called "symbolic" interpretations of artistic works (be they literary, film, or on canvas). Such interpretations always wind up sounding like meaningless deconstructionist pablum.
I have to wonder who these people think they are? I'm a pretty bright guy, and I can figure stuff out. I don't need some self-appointed, self-important, pseudo-intellectual to tell me how I should think, feel, or interpret a piece of art, I can do that pretty well on my own!
Undoubtedly different people will see different things in a work, because each of us brings different experiences to bear on it. And that's a good thing! But some guy coming along and deciding that his interpretation is the one and only right one is nothing more than someone with an inflated ego trying to make everyone else believe that he is justified in having such a big head. In this case, it's particularly egregious since he just SO wrong!
Give me a break. I have never stolen anything that the RIAA or the MPAA was willing to sell to me (and I actually wanted). The flip side though is that there is a lot of music/movies that I would like to have (and would gladly pay for) if they were made available. For that kind of stuff, I have no problem downloading it off the net or getting it by another means because it isn't available at all.
My problem with the RIAA and the MPAA (and MS for that matter) does not stem from them wanting to be compensated for thier work. My problem comes from them wanting to control every aspect of the usage of their product, including when and where I might choose to listen to a song or watch a movie that I have already lawfully purchased a license for. They have no business (or right) to make that kind of intrusion into my personal life! The real fight with the MPAA and RIAA is about who's going to control what movies you watch, what music you listen to. Do they get to decide for you, or do you get to decide for yourself. It's getting very near to the point now where the only choice is to either consume what they present to you, or throw out your TV, your stereo, and your computer.
Finally, it's pretty obvious you do not understand what's at the foundations of the open source movement. As a scientist, I am well aware of the value of being able to look over someone else's work, and perhaps improve on it. That's how science works best, and that simple philosophy is what is at the core of the GPL. People like RMS (and I'm not saying I agree with him 100%, but he does make a good case), believe strongly that the best way to advance technology is to do so scientifically, with peer review. The good ideas are kept by consensus and the bad ideas are thrown out and technology advances. That process breaks down when companies like MS decide that they know what's best for everyone and then hide behind IP laws to avoid judgement about their ideas. Not to mention that I think MS (and the MPAA and RIAA) are just power hungry bastards more interested in maximizing profits than advancing technology and making everyone's lives better (which is something that a corporate charter is supposed to address before approval, if I'm not mistaken).
I think the internet provides the perfect opportunity to teach these skills, but the teachers have to be well versed in the technology themselves before it can be used effectively, and most teachers don't have the training yet.
Well, simply put, there are number of very important skills we should be teaching students that are not easily tested on a multiple guess exam. Critical thinking skills, application of known skills to unfamiliar problems, experimentation.
The extreme example of these are the Japanese Jukart (sp?) schools, the test drilling schools. While in grad. school I encountered several japanese grad students who attended those schools, and who had absolutely amazing physics gre scores. But in the end they had a very hard time making it, because they had only been taught how to take tests, but not how to apply any of their schooling in real world situations.
So how do you change things? Well, don't eliminate the tests, tests should be given, but should not be relied upon to give the complete picture of a student's achievement. The problem is that other methods (student observations, interviews) have a tendancy to be subjective and much more expensive to administer. I admit I don't know what the solution is, but I do know that going down the path of using standardized tests as the only measure of a student's potential is a really stupid idea.
Frankly, I find your rationalizing of the Republican response to be pretty disgusting. And you really are rationalizing, unlawful recounts? Especially when certain Bush campaign insiders came out and said that they had similar plans ready to go if the reverse had happened? They were every bit as ready to start calling for your so called, unlawful recounts, as the Gore campaign was.
What kills me is that you can tell me with a straight face (at least I think you're being serious) that I should be concerned about which party is more consistently corrupt. As though some amount of corruption is acceptible (if not unexpected)! You've just given me yet another reason why I cannot stand to identify myself with either party! Both parties should be severely weakened, and a few very small changes in the electoral system is all it would take. But we both know that both parties are so consistantly corrupt, that it probably will never happen.
When 30-40% of urban children can't read, it's a severe problem. You don't put your head in the sand and say "Gee, it's not that bad!"
Reread my post. Did I not say there were areas that could not use a lot of improvement? Did I not say there were areas where local social mores were such that education was not deemed important? Again, we need to examine what we are doing very closely, especially when there are a number of places in this country where our kids are scoring at the top of the TIMSS study and not at the bottom (in spite of what the sky is falling media say). I did not say that the troubles in inner city schools were not severe, but to go in and muck with the entire system just because we have a problem in inner city schools is throwing the baby out with the bath water. We must look at the problem much more granularly than trying the "one size fits all" approach.
Yes, I have heard of Educational Alternatives, Inc. I am also aware of a couple of others, to my knowledge none of these companies has had the kind of success that would warrant my support.
Finally, I know a number of math and science education researchers that will tell you that teaching math for a test severely short changes the student. Being able to add, subtract, multiply, and divide is a very important to math and science, and are easily tested on an exam. But is that all that kids should know? What about the ability to apply those skills in a new situation? How do you test that? How do you test critical thinking skills on a multiple choice test? How do you test inquiry learning on a multiple choice test? And how about this one: How do you instill a love of learning in a child if all you do is teach to a test? You are wrong, it is a complicated concept. Learning is complicated, if it were simple, everyone would be doing great, and there would be no reason to have this exchange.
A simplistic exam is a quick fix and a cop out that will only give schools that do well bragging rights, allow GWB to give a few warm and fuzzy speeches, while children in poor schools will continue to be short-changed.
1. You should really stop listening to news media rhetoric concerning our educational system. It is not nearly as bad as some would have you believe. (Look up a few articles written by David Berliner). That's not to say that there isn't room for improvement (and in some states there is a lot of room), but I can say with some certainty, that the current plans probably won't work, because...
2. I have seen some of these "high stakes" exams. Yes, these test are the start of something amazing...something amazingly stupid. The math portion of Arizona's exam, is especially bad. You can't very well reward (or discredit) a school based on the test scores from exams such as these. Not to mention the potential damage to students intellectual development if the end result of this "amazing change" is that we only teach our students to pass the tests (see some of the criticisms about the Japanese jukart (sp?) schools.). Dubya's comments that students who can pass an exam have learned something are very dubious in nature.
3. It is completely unfathomable to me where some people get off thinking that because the free enterprise system works for economics that it will work in areas that have little or nothing to do with business. I ask you this: Who are these wonderful educational entreprenuers that are going into inner city schools when the public schools close because none of them are any good? And let's not forget that in some circles, being educated (even graduating from high school) is not considered something worth striving for....in other words, there are societal issues that have to be addressed, and no amount of money thrown at an educational system will improve it, if the local social structure does not deem education a worthy goal.
That said, I am not against educational reform, but we need to take a lot harder look at what we are doing wrong and what we are doing right in a much more measured fashion than leaving the education of our children open to a "free market" of exams that tell us our students can pass a test, but tell us nothing about whether or not we are training people who can think critically, reason intelligently, and express themselves coherently.
You attack the Dem's for their unscrupulous behavior (and I agree, it was simply awful) but you forget how poorly, the Rep's behaved. There is a long standing tradition of manual recounts, not just here, but around the world, and it's generally supported by republicans everywhere, unless it's in the middle of a close election in Florida.
And you're telling me that Bush's aid to faith based institutions program is based on logic and not warm and fuzzy feelings? When many of the most prominant leaders of the same institutions are advising against taking monies from this program should they become available (and they give very good reasons for why this is such a bad idea)?
I know you want to feel that, since you identify yourself as conservative, that conservatism stands on superior intellectual ground, but I sure don't see it. I've noticed that "liberals" and "conservatives" often employ their own brands of logic when it suits them, and occaisionally they even get close to the real thing. But, when push comes to shove there are few things either of the big two parties won't stoop to, to get elected, and the first casualty of such actions is always logic and the truth, in favor of the manipulation of their constituancies, and the demonizing their opponents.
What really bothers me about this exchange and most of what's going on throughout this entire story, is that we've got a whole bunch of people polarized between two extremes.
Frankly, I don't trust big business anymore than I trust big government. They both make me extremely nervous, and there's nothing that anybody promoting either position can say to alay those fears. It would probably be extremely instructive for you if thought about why that might be.
Business can be a force for good, and the government can be a force for good as well. The problem is that they can just as easily do harm. And until more people come to grips with the fact neither business nor the government is 100% good nor 100% evil we're going to continue having these rediculous arguments instead making real progress solving the problems that business and gov't present us.
Remember, the cost of freedom is eternal vigilance. There will always be governments, political/social groups, and businesses that will always seek to gain power over others. It is our responsibility to look at the motivations and mechinations of these entities to make sure they really are on the up and up, and not out to screw us.
Heh. Yeah, I forgot. I hear that one two! :)
But usually it's amoung the particle physicists.
We astronomers don't tend to have to worry about
electroweak unification unless you're working in
cosmology.
Well, yeah there are 5, but in most physics circles, electricity and magnetism are generally counted as one force. I suppose it's mostly for historical reasons, since E & M were unified such a long time ago. Ask most any physicist to list the known forces and they will almost always describe them as gravity, electromagnetism, the strong, and weak atomic forces, hence I called the new force, a "5th" force. *shrug*
You have to be careful with comet orbits too. The gas ejected from comets when they are near the sun can definitely change their orbit. Such non-gravitational accelerations have been observed in nearly every comet to date.
Recent astronomical observations to seem to show that the cosmological constant may not be zero implying that there may be a very weak antigravity force, but it's not really detectable on scales that we can easily experiment with, and it has yet to really be confirmed, so for now, the issue remains unresolved.
At large distances, the smaller terms get smaller. The higher order terms are inversely proportional to the radius raised to a power (larger than 2), so the larger the r the smaller the force. Even if you were to use the full blown field equations (tensors and all) you're still going to get this drop off.
Things really only get interesting at small radii and huge gravitational fields...like around black holes, neutron stars, and perhaps white dwarfs, those are the only places where the higher order terms start to become significant.
In other words, the answer to this mystery does not lie in general relativity, and more likely than not, has nothing to do with gravity at all...there would be too many other discrepancies in things like planetary orbits, if it were, in fact, a problem with our gravitational theories.
Actually Leibnitz' notation is what was adopted. However, Newton's notation is still used in mechanics classes.
You sir, have no clue what you are talking about! This companies' database was built on the backs of people like myself who freely contributed to it, WITHOUT compensation. You are critical of us for wanting something for nothing, but turn a blind eye to the fact that the CDDB owners did get something for nothing! They didn't have to pay a soul to compile all the CD information, it was given to them, and now they expect us to pay them to get back the very same data that we contributed for free! I say screw them the same way they have screwed us! It's only fair.
Well, actually you can expect a pretty bright comet to pass through the inner solar system every ten years or so. Unfortunately, most of the time, the Earth just isn't really in the best position to see it. Usually this means having to get up a couple of hours before sunrise, or catch a few glimpses after sunset, and then the view is sub-optimal. Hale-Bopp (and Hyakutake as well) turned out to be nice exceptions.
But you can rest easy, there will be others, maybe not quite as spectacular as Hale-Bopp, but they are out there. In fact, many people make all kinds of comparisons between H-B and Comet West in the early 70's.