Science

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The Tangled Bank

This entry was posted in Biology Health Care Science on April 22, 2004 by Steve

Interested in biology, natural schience or medicine? Then take a look at The Tangled Bank. From PZ Myers’ introduction:

In cooperation with several other of us geeky science types, I am pleased to announce our own version of the “Carnival of the Vanities”….
Two things will distinguish us from the original “Carnival of the Vanities”: 1) we are specifically restricting ourselves to articles in the field of science and medicine, very broadly defined, and 2) we’ve got a different name.

PZ Meyers is hosting the first edition at Pharyngula.

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City Government at Work

This entry was posted in Humor Science on March 17, 2004 by Steve

City officials were so concerned about the potentially dangerous properties of dihydrogen monoxide that they considered banning foam cups after they learned the chemical was used in their production.

Read the rest of the story.
Via AMCGLTD.COM.

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Beware the Coin Toss

This entry was posted in Science Statistics on March 7, 2004 by Steve

It looks like it isn’t quite fair:

The typical person flipping a coin varies enough in velocity, position, angle, and such to produce random-looking sequence. But when viewed this way, there is no reason for the flips to be precisely fair.
Now, with mathematician Richard Montgomery, Diaconis has shown that coin flips are in fact slightly biased to land on the same side as they started when flipped. By closely observing people flipping coins and carefully modeling the process, they estimate a bias on the order of 1�2%, dominating for example the house advantage in some casino games.

And if Diaconis is flipping they will land the way he wants them 100% of the time.
Via Marginal Revolution.

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Junk Science

This entry was posted in Biology Education Politics Science on February 15, 2004 by Steve

I am sure that there is a lot of junk science being performed in the world but the web site junkscience.com may not be the best place to get an objective evaluation of scientific research:

Unsuspecting visitors might think that Milloy�s site is devoted to criticizing shoddy science, but they would be wrong. If you look at what he �debunks� you will find that the real criterion for deciding what is �junk science� is not the quality of the work, but the political agenda that it might support.

As usual apply your critical thinking skills when visiting sites like junkscience.com and, well, apply them all the time.
Via John Quiqqin at Crooked Timber.

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