CAN YOU FEEL ME NOW?
OUR CELL PHONES MAY FIND another use much to society’s benefit: assessing the structural integrity of bridges. Good News Network, November 4, 2022, reports, “Using the Golden Gate Bridge in … Continue reading
AN ATOM’S ADVENTURE
“A METAL ATOM IS a metal atom,” says Alan Nelson, senior vice president for battery materials at Redwood Materials, a company that has specialized in recycling. “That element doesn’t know … Continue reading
LENA, YODAVILLE, SHIRLEYS, AND THE TEAPOT PART 2
YESTERDAY, JAMES VINCENT began a review of Dylan Mulvin’s Proxies: The Cultural Work of Standing In. Today in Part 2 we continue with a familiar proxy, the International Prototype Kilogram, … Continue reading
LENA, YODAVILLE, SHIRLEYS, AND THE TEAPOT PART 1
WHAT DOES LENA, A PLAYBOY CENTERFOLD in 1972, have in common with Yodaville, a simulated Middle East community near Yuma, Arizona? Both Lena and Yodaville are discussed by James Vincent … Continue reading
REFINING HEMINGWAY’S DETECTOR
ERNEST HEMINGWAY SUGGESTED in The Paris Review, “The most essential gift for a good writer is a built-in, shockproof, shit detector.” I used to suggest to students that readers as … Continue reading
FUNDAMENTAL QUESTIONS IN COMPUTING
THE WORD “ADVERTORIAL” SETS an alarm in my mind: Is this thing trying to bamboozle me or what? On the other hand, AAAS Science magazine uses it in the pure … Continue reading
BATTERY RECYCLING—MORE THAN AN ENVIRONMENTAL NICETY
AS CITED IN SAE INTERNATIONAL’S Automotive Engineering, October 2022, “Recycling battery materials is vital to the electric-vehicle future, but the way forward faces a host of hurdles.” Jim Motavalli describes … Continue reading
THE WHALE’S WONDERFUL NET
IMAGINE THE CHALLENGES CONFRONTING terrestrial ancestors of dolphins and whales: Exponential increases in drag forces when moving through water, higher hydrostatic pressures at depth, and extreme breath-holding requirements to function … Continue reading
FIDO SNIFFS OUT ARITHMETIC ANXIETY
“Whether it’s a tricky maths problem or an unexpected bill,” Nicola Davis of The Guardian reports, “daily life is full of stressful experiences. Now researchers have found that humans produce … Continue reading
DID THE EARTH MOVE FOR YOU, JUST A LITTLE?
THE INTERESTING FACTS WEBSITE reports that “The Earth Shakes Every 26 Seconds, and Scientists Aren’t Sure Why.” Well, this is tantalizing enough to require a perusal and perhaps some additional … Continue reading
