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I found a great quote and analogy from an essay published in Current Biology by Peter Lawrence titled The mismeasurement of science. This essay takes a look at how science is measured and examines the use of impact factors and other metrics that measure scientific progress for individual scientists, academic departments and institutions.
The quote is actually from Leo Szilard, the famous Manhattan project physicist. It comes from his short science fiction story The Mark Gable Foundation from The Voice of the Dolphins: And Other Stories (read on Google Books):
“You could set up a foundation with an annual endowment of thirty million dollars. Research workers in need of funds could apply for grants, if they could make a convincing case. Have ten committees, each composed of twelve scientists, appointed to pass on these applications. Take the most active scientists out of the laboratory and make them members of these committees. …First of all, the best scientists would be removed from their laboratories and kept busy on committees passing on applications for funds. Secondly the scientific workers in need of funds would concentrate on problems which were considered promising and were pretty certain to lead to publishable results. …By going after the obvious, pretty soon science would dry out. Science would become something like a parlor game. …There would be fashions. Those who followed the fashions would get grants. Those who wouldn’t would not.”
The analogy is Lawrence’s own and relates to song writers being assessed in the same way as scientists, an analogy I can relate to having came to science from the music industry.
“It is fun to imagine song writers being assessed in the way that scientists are today. Bureaucrats employed by DAFTA (Ditty, Aria, Fugue and Toccata Assessment) would count the number of songs produced and rank them by which radio stations they were played on during the first two weeks after release. The song writers would soon find that producing junky Christmas tunes and cosying up to DJs from top radio stations advanced their careers more than composing proper music. It is not so funny that, in the real world of science, dodgy evaluation criteria such as impact factors and citations are dominating minds, distorting behaviour and determining careers.”
Continue reading How to Retard Scientific Progress
Nothing goes down better with your sustainably-harvested shrimp pizza than Kevin Z’s homemade Aquavit! Its a very simple recipe modified from a brilliant norwegian cookbook I own called Kitchen of Light. It is a fascinating book, providing great recipes, beautiful photos of Scandinavia, stories and background on several of the meals. The fish recipes in there are to die for!
 Growlers are a great vessel in which to make aquavit! For this you will need:
1. 725mL Vodka, Absolut of course!
2. Lemon, Lime and Orange peel. I use the full peel of lime and orange, but only half the peel of the lemon as my first batch, the lemon was overpowering.
3. 1 tablespoon each of Fennel seed and Caraway Seed (you can add anise or tarragon too, if you swing that way)
I mixed all the ingredients in a separate container, but you can let them marinate in the vodka jar if there is enough room. A couple shots ought to clear out enough space for the ingredients! I let it marinate for a few days to a week in a sunny spot.
The golden color is very nice. After it is done marinating, next comes the filtering. I reused some nice bottles my dutch and japanese neighbors and I emptied out over the course of a few months of Mahjong. Oh yummy Beerenburger, why did it have to end!
I filtered the liquid using a funnel and coffee filter. You’ll have to remove the rinds periodically. I’ll think of a better system later.
The result is golden, smooth treat. This has been providing the liquid inspiration for my Spineless Songs (see my La Musique Profonde at Deep Sea News). The aroma is real nice and the hints of fennel and citrus make it a very pleasurable beverage. I accidentally left my bottle at my boss’ home after a lab dinner party and never saw it again! She brought into work but wouldn’t let out of her office LOL. Though this is some seriously tasty material, it is not quite perfect yet. My next batch, I will play around and tweak the flavor, maybe add a little hint of clove and more orange peel.
In a study published in American Naturalist, Konuma & Chiba publish demonstrated an interesting evolutionary trade-off between “force” and “fit” in carabid beetles (such as Damaster blaptoides to the left) that feed on land snails. Force means the beetles are stout, large-headed and able to crush snail shells with powerful jaws. Alternatively, they can be slender, small-headed and are able to fit into the aperature of snail shells (as in the above photo).
Large-headed beetles were most successful with thin-shelled snails, whereas small-headed beetles were more successful on snails with larger aperatures. It has been demonstrated that the same trade-off diversifies shell morphology in studies of freshwater snails, where elongate shells are adaptive in protecting against entry attacks and rounded shells are adaptive in protecting against crushing attacks.
Functional trade-offs are likely to affect coevolution between the prey’s defensive characters and the predator’s attack characters. Thus, the trade-offs between force and fit could play a significant role in character diversification through coevolution between snails and their predators. (You can read more at Science Daily: The Beetle’s Dilemma)
After my son, Elliot, made an observation that the air under the TV stand was cold I inquired more about this phenomenon from him.
Kevin (me): How does cold air get under the TV stand when there is a wall right there?
Elliot: A spider web trapped the water and it goes all the way into here.
Kevin: And then what happens?
Elliot: It went underneath the floor and then it went into that one over there (pointing to floor vent). If you turn the wheel the air won’t go out, so it went back over there , then it went into other walls and into the door and into the pipe.
Kevin: So the air does that?
Freya (my 3 year old daughter): And the bathtub?
Elliot: Yep, and the bathub. And to the fireplace too.
Kevin: So why is it cold under the TV if its in the walls?
Elliot: hmm… yeah. I think a spiderweb just stick it there and then the air went into the holes in the spiderweb there.
Kevin: So the cold air is coming from the holes in the spider web?
Elliot: Yeah, then it goes up into the roof and into the fan too and into the light.
Freya: There’s no water there! But there is water underneath the floor!
Elliot: Because there is pipes.
Kevin: Why is there cold air on the floor and warm air above in the room?
Elliot: Because it was hot and sunny and cold there. The cold went down into our wet pipes. Its a square. Then it goes into the water pipes and into the sink and into the TV case.
Kevin: Interesting hypothesis.
Elliot: The air goes into the ground too and in the grass.
Freya: And the flowers will grow!
Elliot: It goes in the dirt.
Freya: No not into the dirt!
Elliot: It goes in the dirt too.
Kevin: So air seems to be everywhere right?
Elliot: Yeah.
 Partula spp. from Society Islands. Photo Credit: Marc Agren In a short, but sweet, paper by Lee et al. published in the Current Biology, there is a “glimmer of hope” for montane tahitian tree snails (Mollusca, Gastropoda, Partulidae, Partula spp.). They examined the mitochondrial haplotype diversity of tree snail specimens locked away in museum drawers from 1970 and compared that to individuals from the wild and in captivity between 2004 and 2005.
They discovered that all the major clades from 1970 were present, though severely winnowed, in modern day captive or wild populations. If that weren’t enough to get the conservation junkies jumping up and down, they observed that 4 out of the 5 main Partula clades persisted on mountaintop refuges. This allows conservation efforts for Tahiti’s tree snails a hot-spot focal point to conserve the genetic diversity of the Partula lineage.
“Only a few years ago, it looked like the sole survivors from this radiation would be the captive populations that have been painstakingly established and maintained for decades in European and American zoos. Our new study indicates that it may be possible to maintain genetically representative remnant wild populations on Tahiti, the largest Society Island, although this will require proactive conservation measures.” – Coauthor Diarmaid Ó Foighil, University of Michigan – Ann Arbor (quoted from EurekAlert!)
This also represents the extreme importance of museum collections to conservation. Without proper vouchering and preservation techniques employed by museum staff, the 1970 snails wouldn’t have been available to help clarify this conundrum.
 The plight of the tree snail was not a light one. Of all the partulid tree snails, 61 species were described from the Society Islands. Today, only 5 remain. The culprit? The carnivorous rosy wolf snail (Euglandina rosea, right), an invasive species brought in to control another invasive snail from Africa (which was coincidentally brought over as a potential food source).
“Natural history museum collections represent time-islands of biological diversity whose real value only becomes apparent in the long run. Jack Burch went to Tahiti in 1970 as a museum curator engaged in basic collection-oriented research. At the time, his Tahitian tree snail collections did not have any special conservation value. They are now priceless.”-Diarmaid Ó Foighil (quoted from EurekAlert!)
Go out and support your local natural history museum today! You never know what that $10 admission will do to help conserve your favorite species and how it may advance our understanding of the complex global ecosystem. Better yet, become a member, volunteer and participate in museum activities. Be a part of something great!
LEE, T., BURCH, J., JUNG, Y., COOTE, T., PEARCE-KELLY, P., & Ó FOIGHIL, D. (2007). Tahitian tree snail mitochondrial clades survived recent mass extirpation Current Biology, 17 (13) DOI: 10.1016/j.cub.2007.05.006
This post was originally posted by me July 3, 2007 at The Other 95%.
Wrote and recorded a new song tonight. Was feeling a little anti-establishment after drinking all day (and night).
Kevin Zelnio - Will You Rise
(Player is a little buggy in Firefox right now. If you have problems, click on play button, then click download, a player should open in a new page.)
Will You Rise by Kevin Zelnio
Will you rise when they come for our houses
will you rise when they steal your hard-earned wage
Will you rise up to fight against the righteous
Or will you fall when it comes face to face
Will you cry when they take our children
Will you cry when they slap us in the face
….
will you stand up when the bankers take our money
Will you stand up when your job is gone away
…
Will you speak when you see the violence
Will you speak when they lie straight to your face
…
Will you be there at the front line
Will your fists clench and heart fill with rage
…
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.
 Old Chub is like grandpa. Everyone loves him, he makes you feel special, hands out shiny quarters, and brings a sense of home and order to everything. Dependable, trustworthy and old-fashioned. Oskar Blues is one of my favorite small scale breweries for the simple fact that they make quality beer, in the microbrew tradition, in a can. Maybe its my midwestern roots (we are the beer belly of America after all), or the fact that Alcoa is a major employer in my hometown of Bettendorf, Iowa, but I appreciate a good beer in a can.
Its billed as an 8%’er Scottish style ale and is seriously malty, in a good way. I really like the description of it on Oskar Blues webpage:
This jaw-dropping Scottish strong ale (8% ABV) is brewed with bodacious amounts of malted barley and specialty grains, and a dash of beechwood-smoked malt. Old Chub features a skim-milk mouthfeel, semi-sweet flavors of cocoa and coffee, and a kiss of smoke. A head-turning treat for malt heads and folks who think they don’t dig dark beer.
While Dale’s satisfies our hop addiction, Old Chub takes care of our deep affections for malt. The cola-colored beer (almost black) features a tan head, a creamy, skim-milk mouthfeel, and rich, semi-sweet flavors of caramel and chocolate throughout. The addition of smoked grains gives Old Chub a delicate kiss of smoke on the finish.
Old Chub is the beer equivalent of a lightly smoked single malt scotch, or your favorite dark chocolate. We call it Rocky Mountain Mutha’s Milk. People who tell us defiantly, “I don’t drink dark beer,” often fall deeply in love with Old Chub. We can’t blame them.
Holy crap! Is this a company that knows how to sell a beer or what?? I agree 100%. Old Chub is a nice smooth dark ale. It is not heavy like a stout, bitter like a porter, and is packed with more flavor than an amber ale. Rich and malty and a pleasure to have at the end of the day!
As silly as it sounds, Blue Moon is a sort of special beer to me now. It reminds me of my grandma, Norma (Dendooven) Zelnio, who passed away two months ago. She was a proud Belgian. While Blue Moon is from Colorado, not Belgium, it is brewed in the Belgian style of ales. It became Norma’s signature ale. After her funeral we all piled into the Belgian Village Inn in Moline, IL, where she was known quite well, and drank several Belgian beers to her name while eating Reubens. She would have been honored and flustered to see us all together, along with the over 600 people at her visitation.
When I saw Full Moon on the shelf, a seasonal ale from Blue Moon, I did not hesitate to pick up a six-pack to try out. In hindsight it was quite appropriate being a winter ale, the season my grandma died in, full of character, just like Norma, and flavorfully reminiscent of the holiday season, where most of my memories of her lay in the recesses of my mind.
A fine aroma, like hoppy incense with a slight, not-in-the-least overwhelming cinnamon on the tail wind. Like my grandma’s kitchen full of women and grandchildren making cookies, Belgian waffle cookie irons in full deploy mode tended to by my young cousins Liz and Steph. They anxiously await their time to turn the irons, mastering the art of making the most perfect golden tone that signifies a Belgian waffle cookie, with more batter at the ready while Norma tended to five thousand other things simultaneously. She was always eager to ensure the happiness of all her guests. Her only complaint was we didn’t eat enough.
The first taste of Full Moon had a malty hint of a sweet wine flavor on the back of my throat. It is quite flavorful and not in the way of a typical seasonal ale. There are no Christmas spices overloading your senses, making the beer unpalatable like sipping on potpourri. I don’t see myself drinking this on a hot summer day (hence why it is a winter ale) or crowning my glass with an orange slice, but do enjoy the brief vacation from the typical Blue Moon. They used dark malts and dark Belgian sugar in the brewing process. The flavor of the malt is apparent, but it is a bit difficult to separate out the sugar. It is probably where that caramel-wine hint comes from. Though dark, they stay true to flavor of the Belgian Abbey style. Grandma was very pleased when she unwrapped her final Christmas present from my Uncle Bill’s family – a case of Blue Moon. She would be pleased with this seasonal ale as well. I hope she got to try a bottle before she left us.
Norma’s last act was having her eight grandchildren carry her casket into the church on that icy January morning. Though most of us consider ourselves atheist, agnostic or otherwise non-christian, she would have had a convulsion of joy and delight to see us all together in the front pew of St. Mary’s Church, where she was a devoted congregant for over 80 years. If there is a heaven, grandma was smiling rainbows on that freezing, gloomy midwestern winter day.
 Grandma Norma with her two only great-granddaughters. My daughter, Freya, is on the right in purple. Photo taken by Linda in Atlantic beach, NC 2008.
 You probably have realized I have a particular fondness for India Pale ales. Bitter is better as I say. IPAs also have the added bonus of having a respectable alcohol percentage. Great flavor, satisfying on the taste buds, and gets you good and buzzed – what more could you ask for?
Harpoon IPA does not disappoint. It is hard to tell if it is my favorite IPA or merely in the top three favorite. It is that good. A bouquet that I can hang my nose over for minutes. Full of floral and citrus overtones, like the aroma of freshly harvested hops flowers.
The initial taste is very refreshing. A crisp, sparkling feeling on the back of the tongue. Those aromatic overtones come out strongly in the flavor. Subsequent sips reveal increasing pleasure as the flavors intensify and fully develop.
While this beer might not bring me closer to heaven (or in believing in one), it certainly tastes like heaven and I’ll be enjoying Harpoon IPA for times to come!
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