There is a reason we didn't need jazz up science 100 years ago to get people interested. That is because science is interesting.
That is an extremely insightful statement right there.
Science and nature are inherently interesting. When I was younger, I used to be fascinated by numbers. And whenever I could, I would play around with numbers, trying to do weird things.
And as I grew up, I built Tesla coils and other things and learnt science by doing something with my hands, which is so much more fascinating. Or I would go outside and join my uncle in looking at the night sky, and letting my imagination run wild.
These days, kids do not seem to get to do that. And not surprisingly, there is diminishing interest in engineering and sciences.
To this day, I do not own a TV and I find that I have so much more time to do interesting, fun things. But with TV, video-games and assorted things, kids today (and adults, sadly) are not given the opportunity to sit back and wonder, sit back and be fascinated by something.
Re:Is Roland Piquepaille paid for Slashdot stories
on
A Single-Photon Server
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· Score: 1
Also, for me, computing is an important area of continuing interest. Most of Mr. Piquepaille's stories, like this one, have very little real connection to computing, so they waste my time. I'm not the only one annoyed by this, apparently: Here is a script to Hide stories submitted by Roland Piquepaille from Slashdot.org [userscripts.org].
If you notice the title of the website, it says News for Nerds, not just News for CS/IT Nerds.
Some of us are physics geeks and stories like this are interesting to us.
Now, Roland Pipquepaille used to link to his own blog which was sucky, but these days he does not. He links to an external website, so what's your problem? So what if he's paid? As long as the stories are good, who the hell cares?
So, could you please stop whining? If you don't like it, don't read it. And if you want only your computing related news, you're at the wrong place. Go read Wired or something.
so they waste my time
Whoa. Copernicus calling Mr. Futurepower. Turns out you are not the center of the Universe.
They don't waste my time, and I come to Slashdot for stories like this. Just because it doesn't suit what the hell you want doesn't mean it's the same for everybody.
As someone who travels a lot and has encountered the same problems as you, here are my solutions:
Get another notebook battery - it's usually more than worth the cost. Also, if you like listening to music, using an iPod to do that will help save battery life. Setting your LCD's brightness to a couple of notches less than the highest also goes a long way (of course, this would require you to not be in a very bright environment).
WiFi hotspots are hard to find, but for most kinds of work, the Internet isn't an absolute necessity. I have found that it is more of a comfort than anything else. Secondly, if you are travelling, you can use a wifi card through your cellphone provider, or use your PDA, or have some kind of data plan with your cellphone provider. There are always ways around, if something really needs to be done. Worst case, you get delayed a while until you can find a place to shoot that email from.
Do not have a home desktop. Invest in a good notebook and it will totally pay you back. In fact, I do not even own a desktop. I have a server at home (a blade) which is useful as a proxy when I am client sites, but all my files are on my notebook and a portable HDD. Makes my life so much easier. In fact, when I travel on business, I take my personal notebook rather than the company notebook. VPN is your friend. If I really need to do something in the corporate network, I just remote-desktop on to one of the boxes at work.
Actually, I gain weight when I travel - there is something to be said about the company paying for your food and drinks. There is no reason *not* to go to that expensive restaurant, is there?:)
If the public environment is distracting, wear your head/earphones. Usually, people tend to leave folks with head/earphones alone. Just an observation. And while finding a power outlet can sometimes be hard, the extra battery comes in handy. And if you cannot find an Internet link, you'd just have to wait until you find one or use that PDA.
And I forgot to add - take at least one cheap Walgreen's camera for those times when your digital camera dies on you.
You can always get AA batteries and regular film anywhere, and you will be thankful for it later on!
It would suck if you were at some place where you really wanted to take some pictures, but could not because your memory card was full or because your camera didn't have enough power.
Taking a notebook entirely depends on where you are travelling to. If you are travelling in the Europe, US or Australia, then you can happily chug your notebook with you. On the other hand, if you are travelling to Asia, it would depend entirely on your destination. The same goes for parts of Africa and South America.
Now, you mentioned backpacking - so I am assuming that you do not particularly plan on staying at a hotel. A lot of backpackers stay in hostels, the Y and so on. If the latter is the case, you cannot leave your stuff in the hotel-room and go look around. So, carrying a notebook becomes a liability that needs to be taken care of constantly.
As someone who's travelled a lot, I usually do not carry my laptop around if I am backpacking across the world. Most parts of the world have Internet-cafes or similar places where you can check your mail, offload your pictures etc. And lugging that extra weight (light as it may be) is still a pain. What happens if you get caught in the rain, or if you decide to get drunk in a totally random place? You can't always be worried about your backpack and doing so is likely to give a big hint to folks that there is something worth stealing in your backpack.
Secondly, you will also need to get power adapters for various locations (Europe uses a different plug design and have different voltage/frequency setting than the US, and parts of Asia are a mixed bunch - in some countries, the plug is different but the voltage is the same as US or Europe and vice versa).
If you really feel the urge to be in touch, get a PDA with wireless features and carry that around. If you can check your email from a wireless access point, then your PDA would work as well as your shiny MacBook. And you can also ensure that it's always on you all the time.
The other accessory that I would take would be a nice, cheap, light tripod - look at some of the cheap, ultralight Amvona ones on eBay. They are very light and are totally worth it. And oh, carry a flashlight and a Swiss army knife. Both always come in useful. Also, get a good travel watch - I do a lot of outdoor stuff and I have a good Casio Pathfinder. It is absolutely worth it - it has a digital compass, a thermometer, a barometer, an altimeter and a slew of other features. Granted, you may not always use every feature, but at some point of time or the other, you will use at least one of the features. I have the PAG70-1V, and absolutely love it.
And finally, a good, light backpack (preferably one with a camelbag that's always got at least some water in it), good cargo-pants, good shoes and a light jacket go a long way towards making your life less miserable. Goodluck!:)
I merely mentioned salads as an example of healthy food. You could eat grilled chicken salad for lunch and other lean foods which are rich in protein but are not calorie and fat heavy and stay healthy. In fact, you'd be amazed at the variety of salads that are available that are quite healthy and can sustain your body's needs. Hitting that calorie mark would be surprisingly hard.
Secondly, I was mentioning 5 miles/day not to lose weight but to stay in shape - I run to improve my stamina (I'm a climber) and to me, running helps improve my endurance. And running is just one example. Quite obviously, just running is not going to do everything (and if you have bad joints, might even be a bad thing for you). A combination of weights-training, running and aerobic sports is usually a good idea.
But for someone who fit the bill that the OP described, eating salads and running regularly is a good way to get the body started on the fitness path (eating good food is healthy for you and running regularly and will tire you out, helping you sleep better and feel fresher). Cutting down on sugar (Splenda is your friend!) and caffeine usually makes your body feel a lot healthier, too (you can always pamper yourself to the one cup in the morning, which will wake you up a lot more than if you are always hooked on coffee). And I won't go into the kind of harmful stuff that sodas contain.
I was merely describing where I'm at - I run about 5 miles a day and for the most part eat salads (I also happen to be a vegetarian, so it's a lot easier for me).
Funny, 99% of the really smart people I know play sports in some form or the other (adventure sports, martial arts, traditional sports, running etc) and don't really believe in sitting down and spending every waking hour doing something related to their area of expertise.
In fact, the *really* smart people I know tend to have a life (family, friends, sports, parties) and usually, it is the wannabes that I know who tend to fit the profile that you describe.
And I have found out that a combination of good workout and good diet often helps me concentrate better and sleep better.
For instance, cut yourself off from high sugar, caffeine and soda, eat salads and run 5 miles a day for a month and see how much your productivity increases. You'll find that you can do more, you sleep better and feel a lot healthier.
Besides, sports are a great way to get rid of your frustration. For instance, I do a lot of rock-climbing, and nothing to make you feel better than an eight hour straight climbing session out there.
I mean, even being in grad school gets you a decent stipend and a fee waiver - and a post-doc usually pays enough (in fact, when I was at a certain national labs, physics post-docs were earning 75-100k).
And if you are a research scientist, you earn more. If you become an assistant professor? Even more, not to mention other perks. Associate professor? Tenured? It goes up, up and up - and you get to do other things than just teach (e.g. partnerships with the industry) etc.
So, why bother teaching school kids when you have that path open in front of you?
And btw, there is no one "Riemann-theorem" -- there are several Riemann theorems. Perhaps you mean the Riemann zeta hypothesis that talks about the distribution of zeroes of the Riemann zeta-function?
Great points (and not to nitpick), but it's principal and not principle. The Former is the head of an institution and the latter is, well, a rule, a law or a norm of sorts.
Back to your comments, I think the problem is with the lowest-denominator syndrome. Schools are obsessed with helping the least-capable kid get out of school as opposed to helping the brightest kid be challenged. Once the brightest kid is challenged, it will be up to the others to catch up to the brightest kid.
If they do, awesome - they have gone beyond their abilities. And if they don't, they just have to keep trying until they can make it. The teacher should definitely help the other kids, but not at the expense of the brightest kid.
The emphasis should be on learning as opposed to passing an exam or getting a required grade. Give problems that require thinking and if 80% of the class fails, then so be it. Do not be afraid to punish failure but be sure to reward accomplishments.
Are we so afraid of meting out punishment that we have lost the ability to put our foot down and have some hard, tangible standards? To determine pass/fail based on ability and not on how many students need to get out to get the next round of funding?
This is education we are talking about - something that helps build fundamental understanding of the world around us. Why are we encouraging laziness and callous attitudes towards education? If you cannot keep up your attendance and get a good grade, out you go.
At the very least, the smart and willing ones will get something useful out of the system, which is way better than nobody getting anything worthwhile.
No, a society that does not value knowledge and learning will not magically change its stance just because you offer a few incentives. And even in that case, the learning will happen for the sake of the incentives, not for the sake of the subject.
And that's not the way progress happens in the sciences and the arts. It happens because people love what they do, and want to do something worthwhile. Doing something for the sake of a candy bar will only make it worse.
Why do you think people want to become lawyers and MBAs or play ball and act as opposed to becoming physicists or geneticists? With the latter, you don't make enough money and you aren't really "cool" enough - the end of being rich and famous is not really a possibility with the sciences (unless you are simply brilliant, which most of the population isn't) and the means is a lot harder (endless years in school, needs hard work, dedication, intellect etc).
People should do science, engineering and music because they like them - not because they are given stuff to do them. That's the wrong way to go about it (no matter what economists may feel about incentives, because even then you are giving incentives to the parents and not the kids).
The problem is also cultural. In the US today, science is being looked down upon by large sections of the populace. And science and engineering aren't exactly areas that are being touted or encouraged. I mean, you have people talking against evolution, science and you have the media showing that playing ball or being a Hollywood star is "cool" while being geeky or nerdy is mocked at.
On the other hand, this is not necessarily the case in a lot of other cultures - Asian cultures place a much higher value on education and academic accomplishment. And given their social setup, their system is also highly competitive in nature.
This is not to say that there aren't enough good engineers or scientists in the US - there are, however the question becomes whether there are enough people taking up science and engineering to sustain the numbers.
Also keep in mind that a large section of the population in the US educational system is comprised of international students. Their native countries cannot afford their talents (for instance, what would be the opportunities for pure math in a country that cannot afford to spend substantial sums of money on research?) and therefore, they stay behind in the US taking in a lower paycheck that is substantially higher by their standards but lower by the US standards - in the process, the US benefits by getting the brightest and the best from around the world and the companies need to pay less.
Is it fair? Not entirely, but given the diminishing percentage of Americans in the science and engineering, it is understandable.
The way around it is to get more people interested in the sciences and engineering in schools -- and not just superficially. Encouraging computer science as opposed to "programming" (or worse, web-development or whatever the $COOL tech-word of the day is), becoming an electrical engineer as opposed to a technician, playing ball to help get your way through school as opposed to using school as a stop-gap while waiting to qualify for pro etc.
And who are you to determine the level of sentience?
What if robots achieved "more sentience" (say, collective sentience) - how would you feel being treated badly because you weren't considered "sentient enough"?
What if we encounter an alien species which clearly sees us as not sentient at all, from their perspective?
And what about individual humans? Some are sheeple and some actually think for themselves - what about sentience in that case?
Can I treat them differently because of that? And why not, since you just said that sentience is the clear requirement?
To quote something I rather like, "Because it is so clear, it takes a longer time to realize it."
Slashdot Mirror
That is an extremely insightful statement right there.
Science and nature are inherently interesting. When I was younger, I used to be fascinated by numbers. And whenever I could, I would play around with numbers, trying to do weird things.
And as I grew up, I built Tesla coils and other things and learnt science by doing something with my hands, which is so much more fascinating. Or I would go outside and join my uncle in looking at the night sky, and letting my imagination run wild.
These days, kids do not seem to get to do that. And not surprisingly, there is diminishing interest in engineering and sciences.
To this day, I do not own a TV and I find that I have so much more time to do interesting, fun things. But with TV, video-games and assorted things, kids today (and adults, sadly) are not given the opportunity to sit back and wonder, sit back and be fascinated by something.
If you notice the title of the website, it says News for Nerds, not just News for CS/IT Nerds.
Some of us are physics geeks and stories like this are interesting to us.
Now, Roland Pipquepaille used to link to his own blog which was sucky, but these days he does not. He links to an external website, so what's your problem? So what if he's paid? As long as the stories are good, who the hell cares?
So, could you please stop whining? If you don't like it, don't read it. And if you want only your computing related news, you're at the wrong place. Go read Wired or something.
Whoa. Copernicus calling Mr. Futurepower. Turns out you are not the center of the Universe.
They don't waste my time, and I come to Slashdot for stories like this. Just because it doesn't suit what the hell you want doesn't mean it's the same for everybody.
What a troll.
Daddy was a Goa'uld and baby was Harcesis.
Too bad Mommy Desala wasn't around to ascend the kiddo.
Oh come on. We're all a big happy Italian family here.
RIAA, MPAA, MAFIAA, thugs, rogues, thieves. What's the difference? One wears a suit and one does not?
How's the work-load like?
I've a few friends working in SG, and they're none too happy about the crazy work hours and the 6-day work weeks.
Is that unique to just SG, or is that a characteristic of SE Asia?
As long as I can get off work early and take my weekends off, I'd be a happy camper. =)
Ahh, the advantages of being vertically challenged! :)
Flights are also not half as uncomfortable for me as they are for a lot of people.
Or a Sylvester Stallone movie. =)
Never marry someone unless you first install your own handler at 43h...
:)
Or have a priority access to int 21h.
See? That wasn't hard now, was it?
Oops, my bad. I just copied the link from my bookmarks. :)
Here's the Amazon link to the watch. And it's got almost the same set as features as the 70T-7V (difference being that this one is in Titanium).
And I forgot to add - take at least one cheap Walgreen's camera for those times when your digital camera dies on you.
You can always get AA batteries and regular film anywhere, and you will be thankful for it later on!
It would suck if you were at some place where you really wanted to take some pictures, but could not because your memory card was full or because your camera didn't have enough power.
Taking a notebook entirely depends on where you are travelling to. If you are travelling in the Europe, US or Australia, then you can happily chug your notebook with you. On the other hand, if you are travelling to Asia, it would depend entirely on your destination. The same goes for parts of Africa and South America.
:)
Now, you mentioned backpacking - so I am assuming that you do not particularly plan on staying at a hotel. A lot of backpackers stay in hostels, the Y and so on. If the latter is the case, you cannot leave your stuff in the hotel-room and go look around. So, carrying a notebook becomes a liability that needs to be taken care of constantly.
As someone who's travelled a lot, I usually do not carry my laptop around if I am backpacking across the world. Most parts of the world have Internet-cafes or similar places where you can check your mail, offload your pictures etc. And lugging that extra weight (light as it may be) is still a pain. What happens if you get caught in the rain, or if you decide to get drunk in a totally random place? You can't always be worried about your backpack and doing so is likely to give a big hint to folks that there is something worth stealing in your backpack.
Secondly, you will also need to get power adapters for various locations (Europe uses a different plug design and have different voltage/frequency setting than the US, and parts of Asia are a mixed bunch - in some countries, the plug is different but the voltage is the same as US or Europe and vice versa).
If you really feel the urge to be in touch, get a PDA with wireless features and carry that around. If you can check your email from a wireless access point, then your PDA would work as well as your shiny MacBook. And you can also ensure that it's always on you all the time.
The other accessory that I would take would be a nice, cheap, light tripod - look at some of the cheap, ultralight Amvona ones on eBay. They are very light and are totally worth it. And oh, carry a flashlight and a Swiss army knife. Both always come in useful. Also, get a good travel watch - I do a lot of outdoor stuff and I have a good Casio Pathfinder. It is absolutely worth it - it has a digital compass, a thermometer, a barometer, an altimeter and a slew of other features. Granted, you may not always use every feature, but at some point of time or the other, you will use at least one of the features. I have the PAG70-1V, and absolutely love it.
And finally, a good, light backpack (preferably one with a camelbag that's always got at least some water in it), good cargo-pants, good shoes and a light jacket go a long way towards making your life less miserable. Goodluck!
I merely mentioned salads as an example of healthy food. You could eat grilled chicken salad for lunch and other lean foods which are rich in protein but are not calorie and fat heavy and stay healthy. In fact, you'd be amazed at the variety of salads that are available that are quite healthy and can sustain your body's needs. Hitting that calorie mark would be surprisingly hard.
Secondly, I was mentioning 5 miles/day not to lose weight but to stay in shape - I run to improve my stamina (I'm a climber) and to me, running helps improve my endurance. And running is just one example. Quite obviously, just running is not going to do everything (and if you have bad joints, might even be a bad thing for you). A combination of weights-training, running and aerobic sports is usually a good idea.
But for someone who fit the bill that the OP described, eating salads and running regularly is a good way to get the body started on the fitness path (eating good food is healthy for you and running regularly and will tire you out, helping you sleep better and feel fresher). Cutting down on sugar (Splenda is your friend!) and caffeine usually makes your body feel a lot healthier, too (you can always pamper yourself to the one cup in the morning, which will wake you up a lot more than if you are always hooked on coffee). And I won't go into the kind of harmful stuff that sodas contain.
I was merely describing where I'm at - I run about 5 miles a day and for the most part eat salads (I also happen to be a vegetarian, so it's a lot easier for me).
Exactly.
The propaganda machine has to run.
And use of the medium that conveys the propaganda needs to be encouraged.
Is it really that surprising?
Really?
Funny, 99% of the really smart people I know play sports in some form or the other (adventure sports, martial arts, traditional sports, running etc) and don't really believe in sitting down and spending every waking hour doing something related to their area of expertise.
In fact, the *really* smart people I know tend to have a life (family, friends, sports, parties) and usually, it is the wannabes that I know who tend to fit the profile that you describe.
And I have found out that a combination of good workout and good diet often helps me concentrate better and sleep better.
For instance, cut yourself off from high sugar, caffeine and soda, eat salads and run 5 miles a day for a month and see how much your productivity increases. You'll find that you can do more, you sleep better and feel a lot healthier.
Besides, sports are a great way to get rid of your frustration. For instance, I do a lot of rock-climbing, and nothing to make you feel better than an eight hour straight climbing session out there.
Wallist!
Humph.
It is kind of like negative Mod points. They anialate your Karma.
And apparently, your spelling too! =)
You're not off the mark about the national lab, either. :)
A math position at a university?
I mean, even being in grad school gets you a decent stipend and a fee waiver - and a post-doc usually pays enough (in fact, when I was at a certain national labs, physics post-docs were earning 75-100k).
And if you are a research scientist, you earn more. If you become an assistant professor? Even more, not to mention other perks. Associate professor? Tenured? It goes up, up and up - and you get to do other things than just teach (e.g. partnerships with the industry) etc.
So, why bother teaching school kids when you have that path open in front of you?
And btw, there is no one "Riemann-theorem" -- there are several Riemann theorems. Perhaps you mean the Riemann zeta hypothesis that talks about the distribution of zeroes of the Riemann zeta-function?
Great points (and not to nitpick), but it's principal and not principle. The Former is the head of an institution and the latter is, well, a rule, a law or a norm of sorts.
Back to your comments, I think the problem is with the lowest-denominator syndrome. Schools are obsessed with helping the least-capable kid get out of school as opposed to helping the brightest kid be challenged. Once the brightest kid is challenged, it will be up to the others to catch up to the brightest kid.
If they do, awesome - they have gone beyond their abilities. And if they don't, they just have to keep trying until they can make it. The teacher should definitely help the other kids, but not at the expense of the brightest kid.
The emphasis should be on learning as opposed to passing an exam or getting a required grade. Give problems that require thinking and if 80% of the class fails, then so be it. Do not be afraid to punish failure but be sure to reward accomplishments.
Are we so afraid of meting out punishment that we have lost the ability to put our foot down and have some hard, tangible standards? To determine pass/fail based on ability and not on how many students need to get out to get the next round of funding?
This is education we are talking about - something that helps build fundamental understanding of the world around us. Why are we encouraging laziness and callous attitudes towards education? If you cannot keep up your attendance and get a good grade, out you go.
At the very least, the smart and willing ones will get something useful out of the system, which is way better than nobody getting anything worthwhile.
I don't claim to know a whole lot about economics, but isn't that what socialism is all about?
No matter what you do, you will get the same amount of pay - immaterial of your your skills, abilities or your contributions.
What's the incentive to perform better, then?
Join the military. :)
That's a sure way of having a job.
Of course, the "physical attributes" of most Slashdotters might be a tad problematic in that regard, but hey.
No, a society that does not value knowledge and learning will not magically change its stance just because you offer a few incentives. And even in that case, the learning will happen for the sake of the incentives, not for the sake of the subject.
And that's not the way progress happens in the sciences and the arts. It happens because people love what they do, and want to do something worthwhile. Doing something for the sake of a candy bar will only make it worse.
Why do you think people want to become lawyers and MBAs or play ball and act as opposed to becoming physicists or geneticists? With the latter, you don't make enough money and you aren't really "cool" enough - the end of being rich and famous is not really a possibility with the sciences (unless you are simply brilliant, which most of the population isn't) and the means is a lot harder (endless years in school, needs hard work, dedication, intellect etc).
People should do science, engineering and music because they like them - not because they are given stuff to do them. That's the wrong way to go about it (no matter what economists may feel about incentives, because even then you are giving incentives to the parents and not the kids).
The problem is also cultural. In the US today, science is being looked down upon by large sections of the populace. And science and engineering aren't exactly areas that are being touted or encouraged. I mean, you have people talking against evolution, science and you have the media showing that playing ball or being a Hollywood star is "cool" while being geeky or nerdy is mocked at.
On the other hand, this is not necessarily the case in a lot of other cultures - Asian cultures place a much higher value on education and academic accomplishment. And given their social setup, their system is also highly competitive in nature.
This is not to say that there aren't enough good engineers or scientists in the US - there are, however the question becomes whether there are enough people taking up science and engineering to sustain the numbers.
Also keep in mind that a large section of the population in the US educational system is comprised of international students. Their native countries cannot afford their talents (for instance, what would be the opportunities for pure math in a country that cannot afford to spend substantial sums of money on research?) and therefore, they stay behind in the US taking in a lower paycheck that is substantially higher by their standards but lower by the US standards - in the process, the US benefits by getting the brightest and the best from around the world and the companies need to pay less.
Is it fair? Not entirely, but given the diminishing percentage of Americans in the science and engineering, it is understandable.
The way around it is to get more people interested in the sciences and engineering in schools -- and not just superficially. Encouraging computer science as opposed to "programming" (or worse, web-development or whatever the $COOL tech-word of the day is), becoming an electrical engineer as opposed to a technician, playing ball to help get your way through school as opposed to using school as a stop-gap while waiting to qualify for pro etc.
And who are you to determine the level of sentience?
What if robots achieved "more sentience" (say, collective sentience) - how would you feel being treated badly because you weren't considered "sentient enough"?
What if we encounter an alien species which clearly sees us as not sentient at all, from their perspective?
And what about individual humans? Some are sheeple and some actually think for themselves - what about sentience in that case?
Can I treat them differently because of that? And why not, since you just said that sentience is the clear requirement?
To quote something I rather like, "Because it is so clear, it takes a longer time to realize it."