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Basics: Curriculum Designed to Unite Art and Science
By NATALIE ANGIER, The New York Times, May 27, 2008
Senator Barack Obama likes to joke that the battle for the Democratic presidential nomination has been going on so long, babies have been born, and they’re already walking and talking.
That’s nothing. The battle between the sciences and the humanities has been going on for so long, its early participants have stopped walking and talking, because they’re already dead.
It’s been some 50 years since the physicist-turned-novelist C.P. Snow delivered his famous “Two Cultures” lecture at the University of Cambridge, in which he decried the “gulf of mutual incomprehension,” the “hostility and dislike” that divided the world’s “natural scientists,” its chemists, engineers, physicists and biologists, from its “literary intellectuals,” a group that, by Snow’s reckoning, included pretty much everyone who wasn’t a scientist. His critique set off a frenzy of hand-wringing that continues to this day, particularly in the United States, as educators, policymakers and other observers bemoan the Balkanization of knowledge, the scientific illiteracy of the general public and the chronic academic turf wars that are all too easily lampooned.
( Read More )
NASA Spacecraft Ready to Dig on Mars
By KENNETH CHANG, The New York Times, May 27, 2008
PASADENA, Calif. — One day after a picture-perfect landing on Mars, NASA’s Phoenix lander seemed Monday to be in perfect health.
The spacecraft has redundant systems to survive the failure of some components, and mission controllers have drawn up contingency plans for possible problems.
“Up to this point, we haven’t needed any of it,” said Edward Sedivy, the Phoenix program manager at Lockheed Martin Space Systems in Denver, which built the spacecraft.
At a news conference on Monday, NASA released a photograph made possible by another engineering tour de force. On Sunday, the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, passing by at an altitude of 192 miles and traveling 7,600 miles per hour, snapped a picture of the Phoenix and its billowing parachute as it descended through the Martian air to its landing site.
( Read More )
Experts Question Placebo Pill for Children
By CHRISTIE ASCHWANDEN, The New York Times, May 27, 2008
Jennifer Buettner was taking care of her young niece when the idea struck her. The child had a nagging case of hypochondria, and Ms. Buettner’s mother-in-law, a nurse, instructed her to give the girl a Motrin tablet.
“She told me it was the most benign thing I could give,” Ms. Buettner said. “I thought, why give her any drug? Why not give her a placebo?”
( Read More )
Observatory: Glaciers in Antarctica May Be Releasing DDT Through Meltwater
By HENRY FOUNTAIN, The New York Times, May 27, 2008
Global use of the pesticide DDT has been sharply curtailed since the 1970s, so it’s natural to expect that over time, less of it would find its way into living creatures. And that has generally been the case: although many organisms still have detectable levels of DDT in fatty tissues, those levels have generally declined.
Not so among Adélie penguins in the Western Antarctic Peninsula, however, according to a study in the journal Environmental Science and Technology. DDT levels in these birds have remained about the same in the past 30 years, and the researchers say it’s likely that Antarctic glaciers, which would have accumulated DDT through atmospheric deposition before its use was restricted, are delivering the pesticide into the food chain through meltwater.
( Read More )
By NATALIE ANGIER, The New York Times, May 27, 2008
Senator Barack Obama likes to joke that the battle for the Democratic presidential nomination has been going on so long, babies have been born, and they’re already walking and talking.
That’s nothing. The battle between the sciences and the humanities has been going on for so long, its early participants have stopped walking and talking, because they’re already dead.
It’s been some 50 years since the physicist-turned-novelist C.P. Snow delivered his famous “Two Cultures” lecture at the University of Cambridge, in which he decried the “gulf of mutual incomprehension,” the “hostility and dislike” that divided the world’s “natural scientists,” its chemists, engineers, physicists and biologists, from its “literary intellectuals,” a group that, by Snow’s reckoning, included pretty much everyone who wasn’t a scientist. His critique set off a frenzy of hand-wringing that continues to this day, particularly in the United States, as educators, policymakers and other observers bemoan the Balkanization of knowledge, the scientific illiteracy of the general public and the chronic academic turf wars that are all too easily lampooned.
( Read More )
NASA Spacecraft Ready to Dig on Mars
By KENNETH CHANG, The New York Times, May 27, 2008
PASADENA, Calif. — One day after a picture-perfect landing on Mars, NASA’s Phoenix lander seemed Monday to be in perfect health.
The spacecraft has redundant systems to survive the failure of some components, and mission controllers have drawn up contingency plans for possible problems.
“Up to this point, we haven’t needed any of it,” said Edward Sedivy, the Phoenix program manager at Lockheed Martin Space Systems in Denver, which built the spacecraft.
At a news conference on Monday, NASA released a photograph made possible by another engineering tour de force. On Sunday, the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, passing by at an altitude of 192 miles and traveling 7,600 miles per hour, snapped a picture of the Phoenix and its billowing parachute as it descended through the Martian air to its landing site.
( Read More )
Experts Question Placebo Pill for Children
By CHRISTIE ASCHWANDEN, The New York Times, May 27, 2008
Jennifer Buettner was taking care of her young niece when the idea struck her. The child had a nagging case of hypochondria, and Ms. Buettner’s mother-in-law, a nurse, instructed her to give the girl a Motrin tablet.
“She told me it was the most benign thing I could give,” Ms. Buettner said. “I thought, why give her any drug? Why not give her a placebo?”
( Read More )
Observatory: Glaciers in Antarctica May Be Releasing DDT Through Meltwater
By HENRY FOUNTAIN, The New York Times, May 27, 2008
Global use of the pesticide DDT has been sharply curtailed since the 1970s, so it’s natural to expect that over time, less of it would find its way into living creatures. And that has generally been the case: although many organisms still have detectable levels of DDT in fatty tissues, those levels have generally declined.
Not so among Adélie penguins in the Western Antarctic Peninsula, however, according to a study in the journal Environmental Science and Technology. DDT levels in these birds have remained about the same in the past 30 years, and the researchers say it’s likely that Antarctic glaciers, which would have accumulated DDT through atmospheric deposition before its use was restricted, are delivering the pesticide into the food chain through meltwater.
( Read More )
