science

Will Briggs recommends the works of the late philosopher David Stove.   Philospher James Franklin delights in discussing one of Stove’s works: It is therefore no answer to Stove’s attack on Darwinism to sermonise, as Blackburn does, about how disgraceful it is for philosophers to delve in matters that do not concern them. Marxists, or Freudians,… Read more

Dr Jay Kennedy at the University of Manchester has discovered hidden messages in the writings of Plato.  This should give the philosophers something to chew on! Tip from the Instapundit. Read more

The STEM bubble is long overdue for popping: Harvard economist George Borjas has documented that an influx of Ph.D.s from abroad reduces incomes of all comparable doctorates. Although some people argue that advanced education assures good career prospects, “the supply-demand textbook model is correct after all,” Borjas says. It turns out to work as powerfully… Read more

R, the favorite language of stats wonks, is going corporate.  Not a surprise to the geekerati, but a nice summary. Tip from Nathan at Flowing Data. Read more

Tacit knowledge: "… We only think it’s mysterious if we think explicitness is the norm, but explicitness is a rare thing, restricted to humans…" Tip from the Instapundit. Read more

Herman Wouk shares a conversation with Richard Feynman: This formidable fellow walked out of the building with me, and said as we were parting: "Do you know calculus?" I admitted that I didn’t. "You had better learn it," he said. "It’s the language God talks." Tip from the Instapundit. Read more

What a gentle way to tell kids they’re second rate: “We can’t expect to be number one in everything indefinitely,” Dr. John P. Holdren said at the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS).  Holdren is director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy and chairs the President’s Council of Advisors… Read more

Lane Wallace has some interesting insight on bias.  Theories are nice, but we shouldn’t decide on the whole story in advance. Tip from the Instapundit. Read more

This is why we should shun technocrats: "I don’t think we’re yet evolved to the point where we’re clever enough to handle a complex a situation as climate change," said Lovelock in his first in-depth interview since the theft of the UEA emails last November. "The inertia of humans is so huge that you can’t… Read more

… and it’s all Chile’s fault: “The length of the day should have gotten shorter by 1.26 microseconds…" Read more