Wissenschaft auf Abwegen

Ich war am Montag in Regensburg und habe dort einen �ffentlichen Vortrag gegeben zum Thema �Wissenschaft auf Abwegen� f�r eine Reihe unter dem Titel �Was ist Wirklich?� Das ganze ist jetzt auf YouTube. Das Video besteht aus etwa 30 Minuten Vortrag und danach noch eine Stunde Diskussion. Alles in Deutsch. Nur was f�r eche Fans ;)

The Holy Grail of Crackpot Filtering: How the arXiv decides what�s science � and what�s not.

Where do we draw the boundary between science and pseudoscience? It�s is a question philosophers have debated for as long as there�s been science � and last time I looked they hadn�t made much progress. When you ask a sociologist their answer is normally a variant of: Science is what scientists do. So what do scientists do?
You might have heard that scientists use what�s called the scientific

If you fall into a black hole

If you fall into a black hole, you�ll die. That much is pretty sure. But what happens before that?
The gravitational pull of a black hole depends on its mass. At a fixed distance from the center, it isn�t any stronger or weaker than that of a star with the same mass. The difference is that, since a black hole doesn�t have a surface, the gravitational pull can continue to increase as you

A new era of science

[img source: changingcourse.com]

Here in basic research we all preach the gospel of serendipity. Breakthroughs cannot be planned, insights not be forced, geniuses not be bred. We tell ourselves � and everybody willing to listen � that predicting the outcome of a research project is more difficult than doing the research in the first place. And half of all discoveries are made while tinkering

Tim Gowers and I have something in common. Unfortunately it�s not our math skills.

Heavy paper.

What would you say if a man with British accent cold-calls you one evening to offer money because he likes your blog?

I said no.

In my world � the world of academic paper-war � we don�t just get money for our work. What we get is permission to administrate somebody else�s money according to the attached 80-page guidelines (note the change in section 15b that affects taxation of

"Rate your Supervisor" comes to High Energy Physics

A new website called the "HEP Postdoc Project" allows postdocs in high energy physics to rate their supervisors in categories like "friendliness," "expertise," and "accessibility."
I normally ignore emails that more or less explicitly ask me to advertise sites on my blog, but decided to make an exception for this one. It seems a hand-made project run by a small number of anonymous postdocs who

What makes an idea worthy? An interview with Anthony Aguirre

That science works merely by testing hypotheses has never been less true than today. As data have become more precise and theories have become more successful, scientists have become increasingly careful in selecting hypotheses before even putting them to test. Commissioning an experiment for every odd idea would be an utter waste of time, not to mention money. But what makes an idea worthy?