http://blogs-r.us Just another blog host Wed, 22 Jul 2009 20:08:43 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en Deadwood, Season 2, episode 19 “E.B. was left out.” Al Swearengen: “Stand it like a man and give some back.” http://blogs-r.us/bioblog/2009/07/22/deadwood/ There’s a fairly constant rumble of discontent among scientists toward journalists, or journalism, or the media in general mucking up and dumbing down science reporting. I’m in a unique though not uncommon position as a researcher and writer–constantly getting chalk on my shoes by walking the line that divides accuracy in ... http://blogs-r.us/bioblog/2009/07/17/pitfalls-of-publishing/ Amazing how far the technology has advanced since the early days. It’s a fairly lengthy interview where we get to see Craig Venter’s sequencing facility, here him talk about scientific progress and how he wants to replace humans with “robots and machines,” metabolize coal with bacteria and convert that into ... http://blogs-r.us/bioblog/2009/07/08/big-toys/ Obama has finally nominated Francis Collins for the NIH director. Rumors have been circulating for a long time that he was the prime candidate, and indeed he’s the most obvious, politically connected, pious option. The question remains, what took so long. Collins was involved with the Obama transition team and ... http://blogs-r.us/bioblog/2009/07/08/collins-nih-director/ In a correspondence between Menachem Kaiser and Aleksandar Hemon, author of Love and Obstacles, the obvious answer to a tired and annoying question asked of novelists. The narratives in “Love and Obstacles” follow the life of a Bosnian writer who moves to Chicago, a trajectory similar to your own. How autobiographical ... http://blogs-r.us/bioblog/2009/06/15/how-much-of-your-fiction-is-autobiographical/ So, I’m writing my doctoral dissertation using LaTeX, and I’m completely enamored of the CiteULike + BibDesk combo for managing my BibTeX reference database. It’s such a big improvement over my old EndNote / Microsoft Word workflow. I just came across this great blog post on Academic Productivity about how ... http://blogs-r.us/bioblog/2009/06/15/wonderous-mac-bibtex-goodness/ John Wilkins is one of my favorite living philosophers, which is saying a lot because I think philosophers are weirdos and sometimes kooky (I’m looking at you Plantinga!). It doesn’t hurt that he’s a philosopher of science with a blog entitled Evolving Thoughts. You know I read it. He has ... http://blogs-r.us/bioblog/2009/06/03/a-philosopher-on-species/ National Post critic Robert Fulford applies the four stages of an art movement to TV shows: Primitive, Classical, Baroque, and Decadent. Nifty, but does everyshow follow this arc or can its progress be defined by these criteria? Fulford uses L.A. Law, Numbe3s, Without a Trace, Flashpoint, House, and some Canadian ... http://blogs-r.us/bioblog/2009/06/03/the-tv-show-through-time/ Rumor has it Francis Waterfall-Worshiping Collins, the genius behind BioLogos, is a shoe-in as Obama’s pick for head of the NIH. I get it. NHGRI is a classy institute, the proud Figurehead on the NIH mothership, and Collins was a well regarded administrator there, equally loved by underlines and colleagues ... http://blogs-r.us/bioblog/2009/05/29/nothings-changed/ If an academic pens writes something that winds-up on the internet, what are we to do with it? Aren’t we used to them chirping in some half-recognizable dialect in another dimension? What brings these theory-generators, these gurus of the referential out from the shadows? That Spring is in the air, ... http://blogs-r.us/bioblog/2009/05/12/the-way-of-the-academic/ A physicist also thinks minimally of BioLogos via Collins: Collins may have convinced himself he has “reconciled” his faith with science by waving his wand and shouting “Stupefy!”, but his spellbook has but precious little use when one is actually trying to do quantum physics. Even New Scientist finds Collins’ musing on ... http://blogs-r.us/bioblog/2009/05/07/biologos-issue3/ In light of the recent discovery of my evil Doppleganger, I’ve had to divert precious resources from science writing, book reviewing, and geeky shenanigans to counteract a disturbance in the blogiverse and restore a balance to the intertubes. In other words, every time my BioLogos says something stupid and false, ... http://blogs-r.us/bioblog/2009/04/30/biologos-doppleganger-issue-2/ Meet BioLogos–Biologs evil doppleganger: The history of the doppleganger reads like any random story from the Bible. Consider the Book of Genesis: [In the beginning there was darkness. Then God created the Doppelganger.] The Doppelganger began life as a living fractal, a geometric pattern in the Dimension of Manifestations, able to assume ... http://blogs-r.us/bioblog/2009/04/29/biolog-vs-biologos/ Cartoonist employed by Nike to make jogger video complete with snot-rocket Onwards from akqa on Vimeo. http://blogs-r.us/bioblog/2009/04/24/the-lonliness-of-the-long-distance-runner/ Most novels today are just over three-hundred pages. Are three-hundred pages of words and sentences a golden mean, a naturally occurring length any given work of fiction requires to complete itself? Is this only true in my lingua franca? The alternative is less romantic. To paraphrase Wood, the generous length ... http://blogs-r.us/bioblog/2009/04/24/ann-patchetts-rules-of-engagement/