PhD chemist here, just to give an idea of my work and complexity level.
I do a huge variety of algebra regularly. I also do occasional trigonometry and a lot of statistics. Simple linear regressions are always important, and a certain amount of other curve modelling.
Calculus? Never. Haven't touched it since grad school, but I did have some use for it then in error analysis studies (multi-variate derivatives to be specific).
Then again, I think studying calculus helped me in algebra. It got used so often in manipulating the equations that it became second nature while the calculus remained more challenging.
When I taught, we had a fool proof way to stop illegal cheat sheets. Just let the students bring a cheat sheet.
Of course, that made the exams a bit harder. They ended up being less regurgitation and more about comprehension.
And proctoring became much easier, fewer things to look for (more time spent scanning for cell phones in use).
This has inspired me to follow through on my love of Modern Warfare into becoming a world class mercenary.
I will then follow up with my love of WOW to a career as a successful blood elf.
The future looks bright, and I look forward to proving myself right to so many people who told me my "hobbies" would never do me any good.
I have one of those fancy scientific degrees the parent mentions, and a good job to go with it. I enjoyed teaching in college (TA work in lab and lecture) and think I do pretty decently at it. But it will be a long time until I consider teaching because the pay stinks and I got me a load a debts to manage (thanks to my fancy education).
I guess I'm just stating a moderately true idea that it is often those who can't that teach. I can, so I am somewhere doing the higher paid option. I don't really love it every day, but the almighty dollar matters right now. Would I enjoy teaching more? I just might, particularly the sense of achievement that comes with improving our youth (also called getting to be smug about it). But that field can't afford me right now.
I concur with the view that this is kind of premature. The Nobel committee stated that this is early, and something to encourage future achievements. But I don't see that the man has done nothing to deserve it. I could at least consider that he has...
1. Completely altered and improved the worldview of the US, bringing down a lot of tension that had built up.
2. Reached out to Muslim nations and started a new era of improved relations.
3. Followed through on commitments to pull back from Iraq. He didn't start this policy, I know that, but he has stuck to it and the nation is far more autonomous now then when he took office.
4. Relieved tensions with Russia by taking back a completely silly missile defense site in Poland.
5. Completely changed the US policy on climate change and is working to try and make us actually do better. Which makes every other nation happy.
6. Actually brought Iran to the table and has them acting less crazy and agreeing to ship out portions or their uranium. Sure its not perfect, but it's not a bad start either.
I'm sure there is more, but I'm just saying that there are some achievements of note even at this point in his presidency.
If nothing else, it will be super fun to watch right wingers lose their minds over this. I would even consider watching Glenn Beck tonight, just for the entertainment value.
Maybe for some bugs, but for those nasty caca roches, I get a bowl, wipe the top 4 inches around inside with vegtable oil then put whatever inside... coffee grounds, bananas... whatever... There are tons of dead ones in there but that doesn't stop more from coming. Also, cockroaches are cannibals.
Just a thought, but the presence of so much good stuff (emitting their own smells/pheromones) in your big bowl of food may overwhelm and/or mask the the negative impact of the fatty acid system.
Their experiments seem to be on far more simplistic model systems free from interference.
The device checks for disinfectant (Ag or I). That is neat and all, but I wouldn't go for a "breakthrough in water safety."
Sure, disinfectant means fewer bugs in the water. I won't say that isn't one good indicator of safer drinking water. But there is a host of atomic and molecular toxins that the device does nothing about. The EPA regulates for about 20 different things, bacteria being only a small part of it.
A lot of microscopy like this will be done using very carefully prepared atomically smooth surfaces. A good example would be Cu(111).
I haven't' dug in, but they might also work with something akin to the "depth of field" in optical work to largely exclude the effect of the background.
If you will recall, young Anakin spoke to his master Watto in his native language.
So that makes 5,999,998 he can't understand.
Since we are nitpicking here.
I've just got to say props to the subby for linking to the original scientific article. For once the link doesn't go to some inaccurate, short mainstream media "summary" of the work that tries to stretch this into a complete cure for AIDS.
Seriously a good time to RTFA.
Did anyone else first read this and think horrible things about the Boy Scouts?
At slashdot, I have a suspicion more than a few of us have a merit badge or two.
My family has tried out this exact kind of thing to work on our genealogy. My dad had figured it out all the way back to about 1750, but due to the poor quality of records he had made a few assumptions.
Then on some genealogy website he found someone else compiling data on the same ancestor. I'm not quite sure how he found these people, but he did. Our families should have been related, and the genetics proved it.
I'm told the test mostly relied on Y-chromosome mapping, since that is largely conserved down the male decedents (but I'm no geneticist, so don't trust me too much). Since there was a near perfect match, we now feel certain that the family tree is complete to the mid 18th century.
Simple, and as far as I can tell no giant invasion of privacy.
I once considered teaching science. I currently have a B.S. in chemistry, and I happen to like kids. Being a TA gave me a taste for teaching. But, as I saw it then, I had three big options after college:
Industry. Lots of money, but that isn't everything. In my field, just having a B.S. really limits ones upward mobility.
Getting the PhD. This leaves me free to go back to option 1 later, but with even bigger money and all the room to grow I could want. Plus, they pay you to be a TA in grad school. For chemists, grad school pays a living wage.
Teach. This would mean making the world a better place. Hooray! But it would also mean things like making nearly the same amount of money that I now make in grad school. That is pathetic. Add to that little chance for significant improvement in wages or conditions. Ridiculous bureaucracy to insure that no child is ever left behind. All sorts of certification to deal with. Filthy children and no room for discipline.
So I am in grad school now. And, honestly, who would ever choose to go with option 3? This is why I think most talented chemists will rarely choose to go teach (I admit I know nothing about math or physics people).
Sigh....
Mass accuracy (in the ppm range) and analytical detection limits (often ppb) are not what are being discussed as 99.9% quality. The 99.9% idea is about false positives and negatives in the total analytical scheme. And the "article" says nothing about preliminary chromotography to simplify the analytical process (your GC, LC, etc). In fact, chromotography is incredibly time consuming and could never really find use in this type of scheme.
This technology looks unproven and expensive, thats all I see for now.
My $0.02.
This reads like the most disturbing piece of marketing fluff I have ever seen in analytical chem. I have seen things that are close, but they were in product brochures and never claimed to be news.
Did anyone notice the name of the software?
Bob.
Yep, I can only hope that this program rivals the rousing success of a slightly older beast, Microsoft Bob.
I find graphing in OOO to be completely unacceptable.
I am a scientist, and I generate dozens of what Excel likes to call "x-y scatter plots" every day. They tend to be mildly complicated, but thats OK. I like tricks like multiple axes, ease of changing scales and labels and legends, and also the ability to make each graph its own sheet in the workbook.
I have spent time trying, but I have to conclude that OOO is just bad at all of this.
On the other hand, I have been quite pleased with Gnumeric for my spreadsheet needs.
And I also recognize that I am a specialist with a niche need, so I'm not expecting to have my requests fulfilled anytime soon. I realize that the more picky, demanding, and unusual you are the less likely that there is an open source option waiting for you.
It's no wonder people are confused. Beta doesn't seem to mean "testing" any longer, it just means great product with a greek letter attached. Or at least that is what I have learned by surfing around at Google.
Slashdot Mirror
PhD chemist here, just to give an idea of my work and complexity level. I do a huge variety of algebra regularly. I also do occasional trigonometry and a lot of statistics. Simple linear regressions are always important, and a certain amount of other curve modelling. Calculus? Never. Haven't touched it since grad school, but I did have some use for it then in error analysis studies (multi-variate derivatives to be specific). Then again, I think studying calculus helped me in algebra. It got used so often in manipulating the equations that it became second nature while the calculus remained more challenging.
When I taught, we had a fool proof way to stop illegal cheat sheets. Just let the students bring a cheat sheet. Of course, that made the exams a bit harder. They ended up being less regurgitation and more about comprehension. And proctoring became much easier, fewer things to look for (more time spent scanning for cell phones in use).
This has inspired me to follow through on my love of Modern Warfare into becoming a world class mercenary. I will then follow up with my love of WOW to a career as a successful blood elf. The future looks bright, and I look forward to proving myself right to so many people who told me my "hobbies" would never do me any good.
I have one of those fancy scientific degrees the parent mentions, and a good job to go with it. I enjoyed teaching in college (TA work in lab and lecture) and think I do pretty decently at it. But it will be a long time until I consider teaching because the pay stinks and I got me a load a debts to manage (thanks to my fancy education).
I guess I'm just stating a moderately true idea that it is often those who can't that teach. I can, so I am somewhere doing the higher paid option. I don't really love it every day, but the almighty dollar matters right now. Would I enjoy teaching more? I just might, particularly the sense of achievement that comes with improving our youth (also called getting to be smug about it). But that field can't afford me right now.
1. Completely altered and improved the worldview of the US, bringing down a lot of tension that had built up.
2. Reached out to Muslim nations and started a new era of improved relations.
3. Followed through on commitments to pull back from Iraq. He didn't start this policy, I know that, but he has stuck to it and the nation is far more autonomous now then when he took office.
4. Relieved tensions with Russia by taking back a completely silly missile defense site in Poland.
5. Completely changed the US policy on climate change and is working to try and make us actually do better. Which makes every other nation happy.
6. Actually brought Iran to the table and has them acting less crazy and agreeing to ship out portions or their uranium. Sure its not perfect, but it's not a bad start either.
I'm sure there is more, but I'm just saying that there are some achievements of note even at this point in his presidency.
If nothing else, it will be super fun to watch right wingers lose their minds over this. I would even consider watching Glenn Beck tonight, just for the entertainment value.
Maybe for some bugs, but for those nasty caca roches, I get a bowl, wipe the top 4 inches around inside with vegtable oil then put whatever inside... coffee grounds, bananas... whatever... There are tons of dead ones in there but that doesn't stop more from coming. Also, cockroaches are cannibals.
Just a thought, but the presence of so much good stuff (emitting their own smells/pheromones) in your big bowl of food may overwhelm and/or mask the the negative impact of the fatty acid system. Their experiments seem to be on far more simplistic model systems free from interference.
The device checks for disinfectant (Ag or I). That is neat and all, but I wouldn't go for a "breakthrough in water safety." Sure, disinfectant means fewer bugs in the water. I won't say that isn't one good indicator of safer drinking water. But there is a host of atomic and molecular toxins that the device does nothing about. The EPA regulates for about 20 different things, bacteria being only a small part of it.
A lot of microscopy like this will be done using very carefully prepared atomically smooth surfaces. A good example would be Cu(111). I haven't' dug in, but they might also work with something akin to the "depth of field" in optical work to largely exclude the effect of the background.
If you will recall, young Anakin spoke to his master Watto in his native language. So that makes 5,999,998 he can't understand. Since we are nitpicking here.
It is a widely accepted term in the field, well known to certain physicists/chemists. But Google might help you learn something new.
I've just got to say props to the subby for linking to the original scientific article. For once the link doesn't go to some inaccurate, short mainstream media "summary" of the work that tries to stretch this into a complete cure for AIDS. Seriously a good time to RTFA.
Has anyone given thought to remaking Duke Nukem?
It won't be much of a pain due to the blindingly fast Windows 7 boot time, right?
Did anyone else first read this and think horrible things about the Boy Scouts? At slashdot, I have a suspicion more than a few of us have a merit badge or two.
My family has tried out this exact kind of thing to work on our genealogy. My dad had figured it out all the way back to about 1750, but due to the poor quality of records he had made a few assumptions.
Then on some genealogy website he found someone else compiling data on the same ancestor. I'm not quite sure how he found these people, but he did. Our families should have been related, and the genetics proved it.
I'm told the test mostly relied on Y-chromosome mapping, since that is largely conserved down the male decedents (but I'm no geneticist, so don't trust me too much). Since there was a near perfect match, we now feel certain that the family tree is complete to the mid 18th century.
Simple, and as far as I can tell no giant invasion of privacy.
- Industry. Lots of money, but that isn't everything. In my field, just having a B.S. really limits ones upward mobility.
- Getting the PhD. This leaves me free to go back to option 1 later, but with even bigger money and all the room to grow I could want. Plus, they pay you to be a TA in grad school. For chemists, grad school pays a living wage.
- Teach. This would mean making the world a better place. Hooray! But it would also mean things like making nearly the same amount of money that I now make in grad school. That is pathetic. Add to that little chance for significant improvement in wages or conditions. Ridiculous bureaucracy to insure that no child is ever left behind. All sorts of certification to deal with. Filthy children and no room for discipline.
So I am in grad school now. And, honestly, who would ever choose to go with option 3? This is why I think most talented chemists will rarely choose to go teach (I admit I know nothing about math or physics people).Sigh.... Mass accuracy (in the ppm range) and analytical detection limits (often ppb) are not what are being discussed as 99.9% quality. The 99.9% idea is about false positives and negatives in the total analytical scheme. And the "article" says nothing about preliminary chromotography to simplify the analytical process (your GC, LC, etc). In fact, chromotography is incredibly time consuming and could never really find use in this type of scheme. This technology looks unproven and expensive, thats all I see for now. My $0.02.
This reads like the most disturbing piece of marketing fluff I have ever seen in analytical chem. I have seen things that are close, but they were in product brochures and never claimed to be news.
Did anyone notice the name of the software? Bob. Yep, I can only hope that this program rivals the rousing success of a slightly older beast, Microsoft Bob.
I find graphing in OOO to be completely unacceptable.
I am a scientist, and I generate dozens of what Excel likes to call "x-y scatter plots" every day. They tend to be mildly complicated, but thats OK. I like tricks like multiple axes, ease of changing scales and labels and legends, and also the ability to make each graph its own sheet in the workbook.
I have spent time trying, but I have to conclude that OOO is just bad at all of this.
On the other hand, I have been quite pleased with Gnumeric for my spreadsheet needs.
And I also recognize that I am a specialist with a niche need, so I'm not expecting to have my requests fulfilled anytime soon. I realize that the more picky, demanding, and unusual you are the less likely that there is an open source option waiting for you.
My $0.02.
Mepis is related to Ubuntu? I'm not sure I have ever heard of such a connection....
I would be thrilled if someone could explain to me how that works.
It's no wonder people are confused. Beta doesn't seem to mean "testing" any longer, it just means great product with a greek letter attached. Or at least that is what I have learned by surfing around at Google.