Facebook recently added a “Your 2012 Year in Review” feature. It claims to show you the “20 biggest moments” in your life in 2012. It sucks. In no way did it capture anything that was important in my life this year. Why? Well, first and foremost, I don’t post strongly […]
Faculty Life
50 posts
Today, we began lecturing about one of the hardest things to discuss: how creationism and intelligent design are not science. I know . . . to a scientist who keeps their scientific life separate from their religious life, this sounds strange. But the reality is that for many people without […]
19:08: Conclusion of screening and talk. 19:07: ignoring the teaching of evolution is typical; it avoids the clashes with parents. 19:04: Q: Are there statistics on the teachers and their views? A: No, that information is not easily accessible – it might be considered an invasion of privacy. Here is, […]
I was so busy this summer I forgot to shamelessly mention here that I was interviewed for a WFAA (DFW ABC affiliate) story on the importance of Helium to the nation, and the dangers of a shortage of Helium due to a lack of a national helium policy. Helium is […]
Don’t want to believe me, a practicing scientist, when I talk about the false science pitched by the Discovery Institute? Take it from the mouth of a religious scholar [1]. SMU’s Chair of Religious Studies, Dr. Mark Chancey, today rebutted the Victory Campus Ministry’s opinion piece [2], which itself rebutted […]
A young boy looks up at Neo, and reveals to him the most critical piece of information about the illusion known as “The Matrix”: “Do not try to bend the spoon — that’s impossible. Instead, only try to realize the truth: there is no spoon.” (The Matrix, 1999) The Discovery […]
The first month of being a faculty member was one of the most difficult months of my life. Changing jobs is always hard, but going from post-doc to faculty is a promotion without a well-defined manual. The federal government made things extra special by creating a new DOE young investigator […]
When I was a kid, I got used to the idea that summers were my own. That’s thanks to the way the U.S. school system works, starting in August and ending in June of the next year. Summers were a time for play in my youth, yard work and play […]
Athletics at SMU can raised quite heated responses from members of the SMU academic community. This response is rooted in many things, but primarily a perception that student athletes are expected, or themselves expect, to achieve less in the academic realm than their non-athlete peers. Setting aside the reality for […]
I’m told this doesn’t happen very often, and when it does it isn’t usually this bad. Today, it snowed several inches in Dallas and the surrounding areas. This caused the expected knot of traffic, accidents, people doing generally stupid things that work great on dry pavement and terribly under low-friction […]
This has been a whirlwind week for me. Ever since I arrived in Geneva last week, I’ve been keeping myself as busy as a grad student so that I can be a more effective professor. I truly need to understand something of ATLAS before I can lead a group of […]
We are enjoying a quiet Sunday morning. This month has been extremely busy, and for at least a little while this weekend we can return to something resembling quiet. Jodi is making pumpkin waffles. “Car Talk” is on the Stevo (my MythTV box), to be followed by “Wait, Wait Don’t […]