I do stat mech. Most of the papers I read pay very little attention to assigning a level statistical significance to their "measurements". When they do, assumptions of uncorrelated measurements are always made - and probably incorrectly. I struggle with the statistics myself. I find myself working out of my undergraduate stats text mostly. I feel I'm more concerned with understanding how statistically meaningful my measurements are than most of my colleagues. And I worry about my understanding of the statistical methods I use.
Had a subscription for a year. I quit reading after just a few issues. The news is stale, which is fine for a weekly periodical. But the analysis was terrible. Shallow, biased, often misinformed. Not surprised they missed this. Just one among a titanic pile of crap.
"It serves no purpose but to try and get more money out of my wallet"
If they succeed then didn't they make your life better? It's not a forced transaction. Presumably they get that money from you because they have something in exchange that you value more than the money (or the effort you put into getting it).
"That's the definition of disengenuous. I appologize if my accurate vocabulary has offended you. Would using 'deceitful' or 'b***s***' be better recieved?"
I don't know. It's not that I really care what you think - this is just entertainment for me. The thing is that it is cliched, and an obvious attempt to sound smart. At the end of the day, it's shallow and pedantic.
"You suggest that the logic behind the space program was a deliberate measure to advance polymer tech, or some reusable method of sticking one thing to another"
No I didn't. You did. And I agree that it's a stupid idea.
"In case you're missing my point (and you are) you won't purposefully develop tech to overcome challenges you havent faced. And further advances in that tech are less likely (and often impossible) if you dont have a compelling reason to face them to begin with."
That wasn't your point. I can still read it. It's up there a few comments. You can't redefine it now. Your point was that the program wasn't a waste of money since it produced useful tech, and that in turn produced tax revenue. I get why you think that. It is an often used defense of the space program, and you are just parroting it.
As to the idea of the space program producing useful solutions to as yet formulated problems; NASA itself list the most used spin-off tech as advances to preexisting tech. Like water purification, or computing, or weather forecasting, or shock absorption, or radiation shielding. They spent money to advance these technologies so that they could shoot a rocket into space. They could have done the same, save the rocket, and we'd be up millions.
"My statement was meant to point out that because of the space program there are many advances in science that..."
Really, no. Your post was a reply to a comment about the vast money wasted. It implied that the money wasn't wasted because it generated tax revenue from scientific progress. No doubt the progress and subsequent revenue would have been much greater had the money been targeted at specific problems.
I do this sort of stuff, and was about to chime in and say that 24 million wasn't really all that much. I think your post put it into perspective nicely, though.
First convince me that sending a man to the moon is a good way to do R&D for polymers, or velcro, or whatever you see as the spin off technology.. That is, the best way to develop a desired technology isn't to invest in a solution to an entirely different problem in the hope that it might generate some peripherally related know-how. Why not send a man to the center of the earth in hopes of a cure for breast cancer?
is where it's at for scientific computation. Folks are moving their codes to GPUs now, betting the double-precision performance will get there soon. 8x increase in compute performance looks promising, assuming it translates into real world gains.
It just so happens I recently looked into the emerging childhood rickets epidemic here in the US. My wife and I just had our first child, and an article in the New England Journal of Medicine (my wife is a physician and subscriber) caught our attention. The emerging rickets epidemic is due to the lack of vitamin D, as well as other fat soluble vitamins, in breast milk. Women are breastfeeding longer, and parents are prolonging introduction of solid foods until later, and further infants are sheltered from the sun. At around 6 months an infants pre-birth stores of vitamin D become depleted and they begin to develop a deficiency. If you have any credible evidence that there are a significant number of malnourished obese children in the US, lets see it.
and I'm sure it's been posted already - your.name@yourdomain.* , where yourdomain has your CV and a bunch of other relevant stuff. Links to things you contribute to, job related interests, samples of your work or a work portfolio, and so forth.
"What isn't known, the precise characteristics of the particles that fall... "
What is unknown is boundless. What we all know is next to insignificant in comparison. Hubris is an overbearing presumption. You don't know what is or isn't known - you certainly are convinced you do, though.
- on your part too. I don't know what goes into the estimations made by the folks who do such things at the LHC, but your comment indicates that you believe you have a *complete* understanding of the problem and can further assign risk from that assessment. Now, you may be right, or very close. People can be right as well as over their head and arrogant. Either way, I don't care. What struck me about the comment - it reminds me a bit of all those quants who thought they had a near complete understanding of a complicated problem and could accurately assign risk to derivatives.
I see this sort of thing all the time. I'm a research scientists. Part of what makes research interesting are the unexpected, confusing results. Emergent phenomena from really complicated interactions. Yet many or most of my colleagues have this kind of surety and arrogance. I don't get it.
in my experienced - I'm a physical chemist doing atomic resolution condensed phase computer modeling. It's so common that I am troubled when the first analysis gives the answer I expected. I likely spend more time looking for errors when the answer makes sense the first go through. Really.
"Rich men trying to give their hard earned money to the government? Blasphemy."
They are entirely free to do so in the absence of an estate or any other sort of tax. The IRS has mechanisms to enable living people to donate money to the federal government, and newly deceased to leave their estate to the federal government as well. What Buffett and Gates are in favor of is the IRS confiscating a portion of *other* peoples estates from the would be heirs. Better to say "Rich men trying to give away other's hard earned money" - which is altogether typical. Far from unusual.
What newtonian mechanics, or relativity, or quantum mechanics say about the world are miles apart. Maybe the math gives you similar results for a wide range of problems, but the implications of each theory are very different. Newton describes a very different world than Einstein, or Heisenberg. There is no "refinement" - we are talking about vastly different paradigms.
which I assume you are from the anemic publication record. You aren't a PI, and shouldn't be held to those standards. If you go on to postdoc or a permanent position in research you will need to get your act together. Your colleagues wont respect you if you are so cavalier about mistakes and inconvenient measurements or results. If your code generated published data it should be very high quality - good enough for anyone to pick up and use. Better yet, freely available. It's standard practice. Don't know what you do, but my field is very competitive and full of very bright people. What we do is nerve rackingly complicated. If any of these folks get a whiff of incompetence or sloppiness they wont work with you. I wouldn't. Errata are embarrassing and have the potential to end your career.
A couple of years ago I had the displeasure of being part of a very political and mean spirited proposed comment/reply to one of my very first first-author papers. One of the putative commenting authors mistakenly replied all when she clearly meant to reply only to her cohorts. It went to me, my then advisor, the journal editor, all of her colleagues - everyone involved. She looked very foolish. That was the end of it.
If you want to be a professional scientists, act professional.
Hmmm. Sounds like some CS urban legend. Never heard - not once - of a "thesis grade". Pass, no-pass, conditional pass. I didn't receive a grade myself. Just a diploma. Be great for those kind of folks that put GPA's on their CV, though.
and see how things play out when the vaccine has been out for a bit. My wife's opinion too - she's also a physician. They're worried the vaccine was rushed and there could be potential problems. So we are waiting, and really hoping our daughter doesn't get that flu.
to received a lot of attention (here in salt lake) happened a few blocks from my home. I saw it driving to work. A young kid blew the light and t-boned a girl, killing her. The intersection had just been closed when I got to it. It was horrific. I asked my wife if she saw the accident on her way to work. She left 15min before me and, as it turns out, drove through that intersection minutes before the accident. Just by chance neither of us were there when it happened. The poor girl who was killed was just 19 - the stepsister of one of my wife's good friends. There was a PS campaign afterward. Her picture was on billboards all over the city. Whenever I saw one I thought of the kid who killed her, and how he would see them wherever he went.
It seems now-a-days I see a lot of nicely done full/half sleeves on hipster kids. I guess that's what they are talking about - the chic tattoos. That's one sort of tattoo. I also see some not so well done, a bit faded, and far less contrived tattoos on people about my age (I'm 36). I think is says something about these people. When I think of my old tats, I think about the kid who got them. Impulsive, adventurous, rebellious, self destructive, optimistic. The kid who would try *anything*. Today I'm a research scientists - theoretical physical chemistry. Life is very tame. No more drugs, slumming, hitchhiking, crazy girls, chaotic times. I'm marked up from those days, and I don't regret any of it. When I see other folks with their faded tats I think they are probably like me. Definitely not chic, though.
in that it gives us insight into who you are. I think this "bitter man" mentality says everything about your personal defects, and next to nothing about women in general. Whenever I hear this kind of bitching I immediately wonder what kind of looser attracts the kind of woman you describe, or alternately, how clueless you must be to have overlooked the boundless clues to your mates deficits. I've been with my wife for a dozen years. She has almost always made twice my salary - often earning a solid six figures. We don't separate out finances, and she has never begrudged my sometimes extravagant purchases of giant TVS, toys, music, whatever. If she were to split today, far more than half of what we have would rightly be hers to take. I suppose it's possible we could have a terrible breakup sometime. But I know her better than anyone, and I can't see her making it so bad as to negate the many incredible years we have had together. I think in general - with exceptions of course - people deserve the mate they find. All told, you probably just suck. And I'm super awesome.
This has been on the net for free, for quite some time. There are several organizations that have been compiling this information in a nice interactive format, and making it available - no tax money involved. I've looked over a few of these sites, and the feds as well. The federal site doesn't have much in the way of extra information, other than feel good descriptions (read advertising) of the way the money *will* be spent.
my wife sees it all the time - dead livers. The concern isn't for people taking this on prescription. They can get a different preparation if necessary. Good riddance. Better yet, get rid of the whole prescription regime. Many doctors are sick of being the narcotic gate keeper. On one side is the DEA looking to pull your license and prosecute, on the other a patient who may or may no be in pain. It's the doctors responsibility to correctly identify drug seekers. Chronic pain rarely kills. What would you do if your livelihood could be taken away for prescribing narcotics to a patient who you believed to be in pain, but was a very clever junkie? I have a feeling there are a lot of chronic pain sufferers that aren't having their pain managed correctly because their physician fears being accused of over prescribing narcotics. More senseless shit brought to you by the War on Drugs. As the late but not so great Bill Hicks said - it's not a war on drugs, it's a war on personal freedom.
Slashdot Mirror
http://www.opensecrets.org/industries/indus.php?ind=H03++&goButt2.x=14&goButt2.y=12&goButt2=Submit
I do stat mech. Most of the papers I read pay very little attention to assigning a level statistical significance to their "measurements". When they do, assumptions of uncorrelated measurements are always made - and probably incorrectly. I struggle with the statistics myself. I find myself working out of my undergraduate stats text mostly. I feel I'm more concerned with understanding how statistically meaningful my measurements are than most of my colleagues. And I worry about my understanding of the statistical methods I use.
Had a subscription for a year. I quit reading after just a few issues. The news is stale, which is fine for a weekly periodical. But the analysis was terrible. Shallow, biased, often misinformed. Not surprised they missed this. Just one among a titanic pile of crap.
"It serves no purpose but to try and get more money out of my wallet"
If they succeed then didn't they make your life better? It's not a forced transaction. Presumably they get that money from you because they have something in exchange that you value more than the money (or the effort you put into getting it).
"That's the definition of disengenuous. I appologize if my accurate vocabulary has offended you. Would using 'deceitful' or 'b***s***' be better recieved?"
I don't know. It's not that I really care what you think - this is just entertainment for me. The thing is that it is cliched, and an obvious attempt to sound smart. At the end of the day, it's shallow and pedantic.
"You suggest that the logic behind the space program was a deliberate measure to advance polymer tech, or some reusable method of sticking one thing to another"
No I didn't. You did. And I agree that it's a stupid idea.
"In case you're missing my point (and you are) you won't purposefully develop tech to overcome challenges you havent faced. And further advances in that tech are less likely (and often impossible) if you dont have a compelling reason to face them to begin with."
That wasn't your point. I can still read it. It's up there a few comments. You can't redefine it now. Your point was that the program wasn't a waste of money since it produced useful tech, and that in turn produced tax revenue. I get why you think that. It is an often used defense of the space program, and you are just parroting it.
As to the idea of the space program producing useful solutions to as yet formulated problems; NASA itself list the most used spin-off tech as advances to preexisting tech. Like water purification, or computing, or weather forecasting, or shock absorption, or radiation shielding. They spent money to advance these technologies so that they could shoot a rocket into space. They could have done the same, save the rocket, and we'd be up millions.
"My statement was meant to point out that because of the space program there are many advances in science that ..."
Really, no. Your post was a reply to a comment about the vast money wasted. It implied that the money wasn't wasted because it generated tax revenue from scientific progress. No doubt the progress and subsequent revenue would have been much greater had the money been targeted at specific problems.
"Your argument is disingenuous at best."
Save the cliched argument fluff. It's stupid.
I do this sort of stuff, and was about to chime in and say that 24 million wasn't really all that much. I think your post put it into perspective nicely, though.
First convince me that sending a man to the moon is a good way to do R&D for polymers, or velcro, or whatever you see as the spin off technology.. That is, the best way to develop a desired technology isn't to invest in a solution to an entirely different problem in the hope that it might generate some peripherally related know-how. Why not send a man to the center of the earth in hopes of a cure for breast cancer?
is where it's at for scientific computation. Folks are moving their codes to GPUs now, betting the double-precision performance will get there soon. 8x increase in compute performance looks promising, assuming it translates into real world gains.
"I believe that a scientist looking at nonscientific problems is just as dumb as the next guy."
I agree with Feynman. And I'll add - I've known buckets of physicists, and nearly without exception they are intoxicated by their own shiz.
It just so happens I recently looked into the emerging childhood rickets epidemic here in the US. My wife and I just had our first child, and an article in the New England Journal of Medicine (my wife is a physician and subscriber) caught our attention. The emerging rickets epidemic is due to the lack of vitamin D, as well as other fat soluble vitamins, in breast milk. Women are breastfeeding longer, and parents are prolonging introduction of solid foods until later, and further infants are sheltered from the sun. At around 6 months an infants pre-birth stores of vitamin D become depleted and they begin to develop a deficiency. If you have any credible evidence that there are a significant number of malnourished obese children in the US, lets see it.
and I'm sure it's been posted already - your.name@yourdomain.* , where yourdomain has your CV and a bunch of other relevant stuff. Links to things you contribute to, job related interests, samples of your work or a work portfolio, and so forth.
"What isn't known, the precise characteristics of the particles that fall ... "
What is unknown is boundless. What we all know is next to insignificant in comparison. Hubris is an overbearing presumption. You don't know what is or isn't known - you certainly are convinced you do, though.
- on your part too. I don't know what goes into the estimations made by the folks who do such things at the LHC, but your comment indicates that you believe you have a *complete* understanding of the problem and can further assign risk from that assessment. Now, you may be right, or very close. People can be right as well as over their head and arrogant. Either way, I don't care. What struck me about the comment - it reminds me a bit of all those quants who thought they had a near complete understanding of a complicated problem and could accurately assign risk to derivatives.
I see this sort of thing all the time. I'm a research scientists. Part of what makes research interesting are the unexpected, confusing results. Emergent phenomena from really complicated interactions. Yet many or most of my colleagues have this kind of surety and arrogance. I don't get it.
in my experienced - I'm a physical chemist doing atomic resolution condensed phase computer modeling. It's so common that I am troubled when the first analysis gives the answer I expected. I likely spend more time looking for errors when the answer makes sense the first go through. Really.
"Rich men trying to give their hard earned money to the government? Blasphemy."
They are entirely free to do so in the absence of an estate or any other sort of tax. The IRS has mechanisms to enable living people to donate money to the federal government, and newly deceased to leave their estate to the federal government as well. What Buffett and Gates are in favor of is the IRS confiscating a portion of *other* peoples estates from the would be heirs. Better to say "Rich men trying to give away other's hard earned money" - which is altogether typical. Far from unusual.
What newtonian mechanics, or relativity, or quantum mechanics say about the world are miles apart. Maybe the math gives you similar results for a wide range of problems, but the implications of each theory are very different. Newton describes a very different world than Einstein, or Heisenberg. There is no "refinement" - we are talking about vastly different paradigms.
which I assume you are from the anemic publication record. You aren't a PI, and shouldn't be held to those standards. If you go on to postdoc or a permanent position in research you will need to get your act together. Your colleagues wont respect you if you are so cavalier about mistakes and inconvenient measurements or results. If your code generated published data it should be very high quality - good enough for anyone to pick up and use. Better yet, freely available. It's standard practice. Don't know what you do, but my field is very competitive and full of very bright people. What we do is nerve rackingly complicated. If any of these folks get a whiff of incompetence or sloppiness they wont work with you. I wouldn't. Errata are embarrassing and have the potential to end your career.
A couple of years ago I had the displeasure of being part of a very political and mean spirited proposed comment/reply to one of my very first first-author papers. One of the putative commenting authors mistakenly replied all when she clearly meant to reply only to her cohorts. It went to me, my then advisor, the journal editor, all of her colleagues - everyone involved. She looked very foolish. That was the end of it.
If you want to be a professional scientists, act professional.
Hmmm. Sounds like some CS urban legend. Never heard - not once - of a "thesis grade". Pass, no-pass, conditional pass. I didn't receive a grade myself. Just a diploma. Be great for those kind of folks that put GPA's on their CV, though.
and see how things play out when the vaccine has been out for a bit. My wife's opinion too - she's also a physician. They're worried the vaccine was rushed and there could be potential problems. So we are waiting, and really hoping our daughter doesn't get that flu.
to received a lot of attention (here in salt lake) happened a few blocks from my home. I saw it driving to work. A young kid blew the light and t-boned a girl, killing her. The intersection had just been closed when I got to it. It was horrific. I asked my wife if she saw the accident on her way to work. She left 15min before me and, as it turns out, drove through that intersection minutes before the accident. Just by chance neither of us were there when it happened. The poor girl who was killed was just 19 - the stepsister of one of my wife's good friends. There was a PS campaign afterward. Her picture was on billboards all over the city. Whenever I saw one I thought of the kid who killed her, and how he would see them wherever he went.
It seems now-a-days I see a lot of nicely done full/half sleeves on hipster kids. I guess that's what they are talking about - the chic tattoos. That's one sort of tattoo. I also see some not so well done, a bit faded, and far less contrived tattoos on people about my age (I'm 36). I think is says something about these people. When I think of my old tats, I think about the kid who got them. Impulsive, adventurous, rebellious, self destructive, optimistic. The kid who would try *anything*. Today I'm a research scientists - theoretical physical chemistry. Life is very tame. No more drugs, slumming, hitchhiking, crazy girls, chaotic times. I'm marked up from those days, and I don't regret any of it. When I see other folks with their faded tats I think they are probably like me. Definitely not chic, though.
in that it gives us insight into who you are. I think this "bitter man" mentality says everything about your personal defects, and next to nothing about women in general. Whenever I hear this kind of bitching I immediately wonder what kind of looser attracts the kind of woman you describe, or alternately, how clueless you must be to have overlooked the boundless clues to your mates deficits. I've been with my wife for a dozen years. She has almost always made twice my salary - often earning a solid six figures. We don't separate out finances, and she has never begrudged my sometimes extravagant purchases of giant TVS, toys, music, whatever. If she were to split today, far more than half of what we have would rightly be hers to take. I suppose it's possible we could have a terrible breakup sometime. But I know her better than anyone, and I can't see her making it so bad as to negate the many incredible years we have had together. I think in general - with exceptions of course - people deserve the mate they find. All told, you probably just suck. And I'm super awesome.
This has been on the net for free, for quite some time. There are several organizations that have been compiling this information in a nice interactive format, and making it available - no tax money involved. I've looked over a few of these sites, and the feds as well. The federal site doesn't have much in the way of extra information, other than feel good descriptions (read advertising) of the way the money *will* be spent.
my wife sees it all the time - dead livers. The concern isn't for people taking this on prescription. They can get a different preparation if necessary. Good riddance. Better yet, get rid of the whole prescription regime. Many doctors are sick of being the narcotic gate keeper. On one side is the DEA looking to pull your license and prosecute, on the other a patient who may or may no be in pain. It's the doctors responsibility to correctly identify drug seekers. Chronic pain rarely kills. What would you do if your livelihood could be taken away for prescribing narcotics to a patient who you believed to be in pain, but was a very clever junkie? I have a feeling there are a lot of chronic pain sufferers that aren't having their pain managed correctly because their physician fears being accused of over prescribing narcotics. More senseless shit brought to you by the War on Drugs. As the late but not so great Bill Hicks said - it's not a war on drugs, it's a war on personal freedom.