The summer of 2018 was both predictable and unexpected. As I began reflecting on this past summer, now that teaching is nearly upon me again, I came to find numbers that represented its many aspects. I want to share some of those numbers with you, and the meaning behind them. […]
teaching
9 posts
The past week was a busy one: judging at the Dallas Regional Science and Engineering Fair (DRSEF), the Dallas “Icepocalypse” that shut down SMU for 1.5 days and led to a ridiculous amount of work getting done, meetings with my students about their “Grand Challenge Physics Problem,” SMU Research Day, […]
I thought it might be nice to use this blog to . . . you know . . . actually blog. “Blog” is derived from “Web Log,” a journal or log kept by a person but broadcast publicly on the web. So in this week’s inaugural “Anti-Steve” [1], here are […]
For the first day of class yesterday, I tried a new trick. We usually poll the class about issues that have a real science component, like vaccination or alternative medicine. It helps us to understand what they think they know. We added a new component yesterday, something we’ve talked about […]
I had the pleasure of guest lecturing a few weeks ago in the CFB/PHY 3333 course (despite being on teaching leave this semester – Profs. Scalise and Cotton are mighty persuasive). Here is the lecture audio, if you’re interested: Lecture Audio – Homeopathy (Spring, 2013) We’ve added a new feature […]
Finding Parallel Worlds In the series “Star Trek: Deep Space Nine,” a well-crafted transporter modification is capable of hurling the crew of the station into a “mirror universe.” Everyone who exists in the known universe also exists in the mirror universe, but there they are not the same people. Major […]
In his collection of essays, Profiles of the Future, Arthur C. Clark famously penned three “laws of prediction.” The third of these is the most widely quoted, and simply states that “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.” [1] While in Fry’s tonight, Jodi and I happened by some […]
For many years, I have felt daunted by the quantum structure of nature. Don’t get me wrong – I studied it in lab class and I read a lot about it in my textbooks. It’s one thing to repeat an old experiment, or read a book; it’s quite another to […]
I saw a USA Today article linked from Slashdot that reports on findings that Americans may not know enough science to make informed decisions [1]. When I clicked on that link, the USA Today article had embedded in it a link to a “true/false” question quiz about science, designed by […]