Oh Yeah, a Blog

I'm planning to write something later, and I don't want to spend that whole post saying "holy crap it's been a long time since I've blogged," so... holy crap it's been a long time since I've blogged! Ok, that's out of the way. See ya later!

Awkward Praise [Updated 8/22]

If you asked me at any time in the last 25 years (including within the last week) what I wanted to be when I grew up, my answer would be uncertain. If, in any of that time, you asked me what my friend Jeffrey Dinsmore would be when he grew up, the answer would be easy and obvious: a writer.

I met Jeffrey in the back of Mr. Doolittle's band class in fifth grade. We were both drummers (aka the part of the band the conductor mostly ignores), so we got to know one another by yapping about various things while everyone else learned scales and such. No matter the topic, Jeffrey was always hilarious.

Over the years, I read many of Jeffrey's short stories, and they were always great. To this day, whenever I have writer's block, all I have to do is imagine how Jeffrey would say what I'm trying to say, and I can pseudoplagiarize my way out of the block.

So, of course, when he started a new independent publishing house (Awkward Press), and told me he'd have a story in their first anthology (appropriately entitled Awkward One), I knew I would have to buy it.

I just finished devouring his short story from the collection, "Little Deaths." This is where I need your help. I loved it, but I'm not certain if that's because it's as quirkyfunny as I think it is, or if it's just because I know Jeffrey. So, if at all possible, I need you guys to buy copies of Awkward One, and let me know what you think. Am I right?

Jeffrey has also always had a talent for recommending things I will love. He introduced me to The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. He owned the Rocky Horror Picture Show on VHS before it was officially available in the US, and is to Blane for me being able to surprise friends with my knowledge of the appropriate lines for viewings. He got me hooked on They Might Be Giants. And, of course, apropos to the site of our first meeting, he introduced me to the album Doolittle by the Pixies, cementing a love of alternative music before we knew what to call the stuff.

My point in all of that is that Jeffrey wrote one story for Awkward One, but he also recommends the other authors, so they must also be awesome. I'm just saying.

PS: Have I mentioned that you should buy a copy of Awkward One?

Update: The rest of the stories are also great. Well, I didn't much care for one of them, but the others make up for it. And I'm too nice to say which one that was. Well, ok, maybe not "nice," per se, 'cuz now they'll all assume it was them. Muahahahaha!

Sad Science Monday

Sorry, I had to deal with my sister's dog dying today while I was dogsitting him, so no Mad Science Monday this week. We knew he was on borrowed time, but it was still far from fun to find him this morning. At least it looked like he went peacefully in his sleep.

I'll try to get next week's installment written ahead of time, so I don't have to worry about distractions.

Blog Squishiness

Update: Fixed!

I picked a new template to reset some things that were broken... but that means my blog is so narrow now that some of my photos don't fit. I'll fix it soon... ish...

If you're reading this on RSS, you shouldn't notice any effect.

Mad Science Monday, 7/27/2009

If you've been reading this blog, you might have found yourself wondering, "What exactly makes science mad?" Even if you haven't, I have quite a bit recently. I've been reading papers, searching for things that are suitably mad, and nothing seems to be up to snuff. So, both to let you know my process and to work it out a bit for myself, I decided this week I'd present:

Meta Mad Science Monday: Defining Madness

There's one definite requirement for a paper to make the cut for Mad Science Monday: it has to clearly be science, not engineering. The researchers have to be testing a hypothesis using controlled experiments, not piloting new technology.

Beyond that stipulation, there are a lot of signs that a study might be mad. Here are some of them.

1) Use of Mad Engineering as a Research Tool

When I saw a study involving implanting lasers in rat's brains, I knew there was a strong possibility that I was reading about mad science. Frikkin' laser beams are often mad engineering, and implanting them in rat's brains (and using viruses to alter those rat brains) cements that definition. Robots also often fit this rule. If the researchers are using mad engineering, there's a good chance they're doing mad science.

2) Mergers of Man and Beast

A lot of biological research involves human genes, or cognates of human genes, being tested in non-human models. But when researchers implant human genes into mice to test something unquestionably human—speech, in this case—there's a good chance we're looking at mad science. That particular paper also has another defining characteristic of mad science, which is why it launched this project.

3) Mad Quotations from the Researchers

If I see a story about some research in which they say, for example, "We will speak to the mouse," I know there's a good chance I'm looking at mad science. If you can imagine lightning flashing as the researcher shouts the quote, it's probably something I need to write about.

4) Quantum Entanglement

Any paper about quantum entanglement is mad science. Some of them are too thick to boil down into something fun to write about, but they're still mad science. That shit is just weird.

5) Research Involving Fear, Pain, Etc.

If the subjects of the research have to be scared, or pain has to be inflicted upon them, or otherwise the research sounds like it's on questionable moral standing when I first hear about it (before, inevitably, reading about the very humane protocols used in the research), it's probably mad science. This even works if the subjects aren't human, but the research has potential human applications. That borders on the next requirement.

6) Research with Clear Mad Engineering Applications

Clear applications usually aren't present in my favorite research, but if they're mad applications, they can make me take notice. If the research is aimed at, say, finding the formula for taking over the world, that's probably mad science. Research on weather control, giant weapons, doomsday devices, etc would also qualify as mad science, but I have yet to find anything good in this arena.

Those are the criteria I use right now. Right now I have a Rule 5 and a potential Rule 1 on deck, but they both look like weak applications of those rules. If you notice anything else fitting these criteria, or notice a criterion I missed, let me know in the comments.

Mad Science Monday Coming Soon

I'm trying to get another paper before writing this up. If I don't get the paper in time, I'll cover what I can from the one paper and the abstract of the other. In either case, I'll be back in a few hours with this week's Mad Science Monday. It's a crazy one, so stay tuned...

Subscribing to Specific Labels

I'm sure most of you reading this like to read everything I write, regardless of whether it's about politics, mad science, or food. However, some of you may only want to keep up on one aspect of my blogging. If so, here's how to subscribe to a specific label (aka tag) from my blog.

1. Figure out which label you want (they're over there on the right), and note it. Make sure you have the spelling right. Click the label to see if there are any special characters you need (for example, "mad science" is actually "mad%20science", because the space has to be encoded as %20 so browsers can understand it; %20 is currently the only special encoding you need for any of my labels, but that could theoretically change in the future).
2. Add that label to the end of this url: http://jonthegeek.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default/-/ (for example, http://jonthegeek.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default/-/mad%20science).
3. Add that url to your favorite RSS reader

That's all it takes. Enjoy!

Note: The same trick works for any blog here on blogger, just replace "jonthegeek" with the url of the blog you want.

Mad Science Monday, 6/8/2009

Mad Hypothesis: If I put off Mad Science Monday, and then get sick, people will accept the lack of a real Mad Science Monday, as if the sickness is the reason I never got around to writing it.

Mad Experiment: Do so.

I'll be back next week. I'll try to get full-text access to a fairly insane but possibly awesome article to make up for this.

No Blog

Yeah yeah yeah... tomorrow, hopefully.

Blogless

No blog tonight. I was thinking about knocking out a quick share recap, but then I shared something for which I want to draw a diagram (and, no, it wasn't the sentence diagramming thing). 'Cuz that's how I roll.

Blogless

No blog today, probably no blog tomorrow. Too much to catch up on.

Instead... puppies!

12/3/2008ish

No blog today. Or is there??

Blog Edit in Progress

I have to run off for trivia, but I'm starting to update the look. Thoughts? I'll probably change things far more drastically, but at least I have a 0.1beta version of the header done...

Today's Shared Google Reader Items, 11/18, part II

Holy crap, I cleared my Google Reader list! I shared another half dozen or so stories in doing so, though, so let's go ahead and get those ones posted, too:

• Wired has a piece on why Apple won't ever allow Flash on the iPhone, and their reasoning is sound. In short: allowing Flash would remove Apple's control of apps, since there are already a bazillion apps in Flash and more could easily follow, posted out there on the "real internet" for iPhone users to access without downloading them from the store.
• I've wanted a Roomba for a while, mostly because I want to own a robot, and it couldn't hurt. But now, apparently, I also need a cat:
• Burnt Orange Report dug up Obama's announcement from 1/16/2007 that he was going to form an exploratory committee and think about maybe running for President. That got me wondering, so I dug up the text of Bush's announcement on 3/7/1999. It's interesting to compare what Bush said back then to how things turned out. I'll have to remember to virtuablog or whatever we're calling it in 8 years, comparing Obama's speech to how things turned out. He's done a good job so far of sticking with the same message, but who knows what might happen over the next 8 years. I mean, who other than James Dobson.
• Indecision 2008 over at Comedy Central has discovered Time magazine's pressing question for this year: Who will be Time Magazine's Barack Obama of the Year?
• Finally, this photo that PZ Myers found at Scientific American is simply stunning. Number 15 is also pretty cool, but I share PZ's enthusiasm for #4.

Comment here or back at the first part of tonight's shared items.

Edited to add: This was my 42nd post this year. Arrrrrr!

Biggest Month Yet!

I hadn't noticed that I passed my one-month record (set last month, with 15 posts) on Friday. Woot! Thanks for the inspiration to post my shared stuff for comments, Jon and Jeff! Suck it, October me!

Untitled (because I haven't figured out how to title from my phone yet)

Testing blogging from my cell phone. Now to figure out how to fix my t9 word list.

Describe Me

To those of you who actually read this: I need words to describe me and my blog. What words come to my mind when you think of my blog? When I have enough words, you'll see what this is for.

This is my list so far:

• science
• technology
• computers
• politics
• atheism
• liberal
• astronomy
• biology
• chemistry
• rational
• FSM
• Tolkien
• web
• internet

Do you disagree with any of those? Do you have any more to add?

Missing a Few Days

Went to Sixth Street last night, party tonight... so no updates 'til probably tomorrow. Sorry!

Fixing Craptastic Blog Layout

My blog is too narrow to fit a YouTube video. That's ridiculous. I guess this'll be the kick that finally gets me to move off of a default blogger layout...

Setting a new goal...

...and almost failing already.

Last night (probably around 10:04pm) I decided to try to blog every day. I just realized that I haven't done so, and I only have 38 minutes left. Oops.

To be extremely meta (and add a new keyword to my sidebar), that's all I'm going to say today.