ScienceDebate 2008 update

I just received this update from the ScienceDebate 2008 team:

...after declining our invitation to debate science in Pennsylvania, Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton yesterday agreed to attend "The Compassion Forum," a forum of "wide-ranging and probing discussions of policies related to moral issues." CNN will serve as the exclusive broadcaster of the "presidential-candidate forum on faith, values and other current issues" at Messiah College near Harrisburg, Pa., April 13 at 8 p.m. You can read more here.

Perhaps among the moral issues discussed should be whether they have a moral obligation to more fully engage on science issues, since the future viability of the planet may hang in the balance, for starters. Is there a larger moral imperative? How about the future economic health of the United States and the prosperity of its families? Science & engineering have driven half our economic growth since WWII, yet but 2010 if trends hold 90% of all scientists and engineers will live in Asia. Then there are the moral questions surrounding the health of our families with stem cell research, genomics, health insurance policy, and medical research. There's biodiversity loss and the health of the oceans and the morality of balancing destruction of species against human needs and expenses, there's population and development and clean energy research, there's food supply and GMO crops and educating children to compete in the new global economy and securing competitive jobs. Science issues are moral issues.

I would encourage you to write letters to the editor, emails to the campaigns, and blog postings pointing this out. And if you can, support our ongoing effort to turn this country around.

I second these comments - I find it incredibly disturbing that the candidates are more than happy to debate their relative positions on fairy tales, yet refuse to engage the public in meaningful debate on the future of the country's pre-eminent position in science and technology, which will be critical as we move deeper into the new century.

Bible and a Pinhead

Oh, sorry - that should be "bible ON a pinhead". Silly me.

Following up on my post from a week or so about folks in the US being "morally against" nanoscience, maybe this story will help to raise the numbers a little. According to Ananova,

Israeli scientists say they've created the world's smallest Hebrew Bible - on a gold-coated silicon chip smaller than a pinhead.

Scientists at Technion, Israel's Institute of Technology, were able to pack the 308,428 words on to a 0.5mm square of silicon by etching its surface with particle beams.

He said he now wanted to take pictures of the nano-Bible and blow it up to a seven-by-seven metre poster, which will make it "possible to read the entire bible with the naked eye".

The tiny Bible was developed as part of an educational drive to increase interest in nanoscience among teenagers.

So, there you go. Increasing nanoscience interest amongst teenagers.

Sheesh. There must be a better use of resources.

I got a Big Word!

Just started up is a new site aiming to redefine every word in the English language. For a small fee ($1 per letter), you can own a word in The Big Word Project's dictionary, and have it linked to your site.

The Big Word Project is redefining words. You pick a word and link it to your website. Your website is then the new definition. Simple.

How cool is that!

You have to act fast, because words are being snapped up pretty quickly. Good news though!

I scored "atheist"!!

Apples vs. Pearls

So, I got an iPod Touch for Christmas (yay me!). It's amazing. And, the $20 update notwithstanding, a marvel of technology. I'm constantly blown away by the multitouch interface, and the intuitive control scheme.

What prompted me to write this post though, is that a family member just got a new phone - a Blackberry Pearl. It's very pretty. The first thing I did when I played with it? Tried to touch the icons on the screen. Nothing. Amazing. I'd expected the thing to just work, intuitively, by touch. I was surprised and confused when it didn't - it took me a little while to readjust to the notion that not everything was as easy to use as an iPod Touch/iPhone.

OK, I say to myself, it should still be easy though, right? It's got email, like my Touch, and a web browser, and other cool stuff too. I'm smart. I like technology. How hard can it be to get it to work?

You figure it out. How do I get to the browser? Check my email? Listen to some tunes?
I defy you to do it without looking at the manual . Here's the iPhone equivalent:

Believe me folks, this is the future.

A Quick plug...

...for the day job. We've started a new blog over here that touches on what I do every day - check it out if you're into developing software applications.

iTunes U

Apple has updated it's iTunes store to version 7.2. One of the updates is access to iTunes U, which includes free lectures, speeches, sports clips and more from top universities like Stanford and MIT. I've been perusing the offerings, and it includes such courses as:

• Modern Theoretical Physics from Stanford
• Introductory Astronomy from UC Berkeley
• Electricity and Magnetism from MIT

and many more, including courses on Biology and evolution from a variety of high profile schools. I wonder if we should pass this information on to the Discovery Institute or Ken Ham at the Creation Museum. They could use some grounding in basic science.