Tag: science

  • Fascinations

    Fascinations

    I had a gloriously geeky evening on Thursday. I’ve been taking the Master Naturalist class, so my Thursday evenings have been devoted to a lifelong fascination with the world around me. Lectures on botany, mycology, geology, and more… I’ve missed this kind of learning. So I showed up to the classroom where the class is…

  • Ask Questions

    Ask Questions

    I find myself a little frustrated and annoyed today. I had been given a Christmas giftcard by my boss, for Amazon. My immediate thought was ‘I’ll buy a book!’ because it would enable me to spend a bit more on a book than I’d ordinarily spend on myself. These days, when I buy paper books,…

  • Regressing

    Regressing

    After Drak recommended God in the Dock in response to yesterday’s post, I picked it up. It’s been a while since I read CS Lewis, and I knew I hadn’t read that collection of essays. I’m delighted I impulse bought this book. The essays are a broad collection, apologetics, yes, but it’s Lewis. He had…

  • Story Science

    Story Science

      Yesterday’s story – which ended with biochemically powered holographic displays – was inspired by real science.  “For foods, holograms made with nanoparticles have been proposed, but the tiny particles can generate reactive oxygen species, which might be harmful for people to eat. In a different approach, food scientists have molded edible holograms onto chocolate,…

  • Ready to Time Travel?

    Ready to Time Travel?

      A new mathematical model purports to show that time travel without paradox is possible.  As a writer, I’m looking at the article thinking… just how many ways could this go wrong?  “The range of mathematical processes we discovered show that time travel with free will is logically possible in our universe without any paradox.”

  • Golden Cyberpunk Butterflies

    Golden Cyberpunk Butterflies

      Short one today – it’s been a week. I can’t talk about most of it here, maybe later. Suffice it to say I’m tired, and still have a full day ahead of me. The weekend with all it’s plethora of chores and obligations beckons with a promise of some time to relax and digest…

  • I’m Positive it’s Science

    I’m Positive it’s Science

      Even if sometimes the results aren’t what everyone was expecting.  I was noodling around and came across a couple of things I thought I’d toss on here as I’m out of time this morning. Firstly, this is a scathing abstract, and made me giggle a little. If you read between the lines, as I…

  • Windows into the Past

    Windows into the Past

      A pair of papers came to my attention this last week, and they are fascinating to me on several levels, as a scientist, a writer, and one who dabbles in history. Science and technology working hand in hand have been advancing mightily in the last few years toward being able to see more and…

  • Science Fiction… Sweaters?

    Science Fiction… Sweaters?

      Over the last century or so of science fiction writing and film, there have been many iterations of garments posited for the far future. From sleek jumpsuits, to nakedness, to Dejah Thoris’s jeweled harnesses to the Star Trek redshirt… Now that we are living in the science fiction present, what does the reality for…

  • The Pearly Cities of Luna

    The Pearly Cities of Luna

    It’s like something straight out of a pulp novelist’s wildest dreams. Colonies on the moon, roofed over by nacre. But it’s got a slim possiblity of becoming a reality, if you read this paper on the generation of mother-of-pearl by bacteria.  I have to shake my head a little over the concept of a spacesuited…

  • 10 GMO Myths and Realities

    10 GMO Myths and Realities

    So I don’t have time for a post today – I’m fighting off the flu still, but was able to get back to work at last. Still leaves me absolutely wrung out, though. So you get this excellent article refuting some of the commonly used arguments against GMO and glyphosate. The science, time and again,…

  • One Step Closer to Brain Ships

    One Step Closer to Brain Ships

    Who hasn’t read a science fiction story involving brain implants that allow the characters to control computer interfaces? The best known, I suspect, at least to me, is the Brain Ship series, where severely physically disabled people get the chance to have adventures through their interface with a starship. Now, current science has made strides…