One simple experiment I have on the go has given me pause to reflect on the data — largely thanks to the time gap between finding the next point. But I’ve appreciated having an opportunity to stop and think about individual data points carefully. Not because the underlying data is that novel. Rather I’ve specifically considered how each of those data points affect my regression and the numeric estimates of the true relationship for the data....
What Led to Reading Starter Villain Earlier this year I’d recently had my first exposure to John Scalzi’s science fiction writing. His name is regularly echoed in various science fiction forum threads, hence when I spotted his name on the spine of a paperback, sitting on the shelf of my city library’s tiny science fiction and fantasy section, I decided to give the book a chance. My starting point was The Collapsing Empire (2018), which I read in short order followed by The Consuming Fire (2018) and The Last Emperox (2020), which together comprise his Interdependency Sequence trilogy....
This weekend I wrapped up volunteering at a summer day camp for kids ages 5 to 12. The experience was a first for me, seeing a summer day camp of that type. While I’ve gone on many outdoor camping trips, I’d never experienced, neither as a participant nor as a volunteer, a summer day camp. It wasn’t really “camp”, as I’d understood the term, but more of a blitz of activities, learning, crafts, and fun for the kids within the walls of a modest suburban church building in my neighbourhood....
Introduction Avoiding COVID… Until Now Since the start of the pandemic, I’ve been doing my part to flatten the curve, in accordance with public health guidance insofar as possible. Over the course of the pandemic’s evolution, this has involved social and physical distancing, limiting gatherings, limiting travel, additional hand sanitizing, mask wearing, getting vaccinated, and getting boosters as advised. i.e. Generally following the advice of public health experts. But the concept of “flattening the curve” is not that one will never catch COVID....
Once Upon A WordPress Originally this blog came to life on September 10th, 2009. It was my 3rd self-hosted blog effort and I’d been experimenting for a little over 1 year, having purchased 2 years of webhosting in the summer of 2008. My first blogs were very limited in audience scope: one being focused keeping friends & relatives updated while I was travelling overseas for 3 months; another kept to share notes with friends....
Genealogy is a pastime that I occasionally indulge in. There are some very fascinating stories to be learned about the history of one’s genetic forebearers, as the tale of ancestry interweaves with the movements of history. Discovering one’s family history requires investigative skills for combing through resources — many of which are online. Some of those (with Canadian content) are freely available: Library and Archives Canada, FamilySearch, Automated Genealogy, and others....
The trend toward intentionally ignoring data that does not agree with one’s biases only continues. A 2010 article from Scientific American discussing emails received by climate scientists: Trenberth* says that is the most dispiriting aspect of the e-mails: Facts don’t carry more weight in the public debate. The nature of public discourse - be it climate change or health care - has changed; information that does not fit one’s worldview is now discounted or rejected....
There are some really useful subreddits hidden away on Reddit and it can be a great place to get questions answered. AskScience is my favourite example. There are also a few more technical, narrowly focused sub-forums, so I wondered if there was one for ImageJ or Image Analysis. Sadly, neither exists. So I did what Reddit is meant to enable individuals to do: I created a subreddit, r/ImageJ. So far I’m the only one posting in it, but I hope that will change....
Kids are never the problem. They are born scientists. The problem is always the adults. The beat the curiosity out of the kids. They out-number kids. They vote. They wield resources. That’s why my public focus is primarily adults. [Source] Neil deGrasse Tyson, answering a question in his AMA on Reddit a few months ago: “Can we inspire more kids to pursue space-related science and research? If so, how?...
Hints of Revolution Every time that I sign into Flickr, the digital revolution in science becomes apparent to me. One would expect this to be most realized through my daily accessing of science journals via the internet, however that is access to scientific papers, but not necessarily scientific information. Journals and publishers largely remain the gatekeepers of scientific knowledge, but here I see a a new trend in the digital revolution in how we find and access scientific information, which is larger than journals alone, and which could eventually lead to greater democratization of science and more widespread access to science....