brainstorms

Thursday December 15, 2005

found inside a shoebox [images]

assorted images [not really stored in shoeboxes] from the past: an abandoned house in new brunswick, a restored house in istanbul's sogukcesme street, shadow of a street lamp in the french quarter [new orleans], a maple tree in autumn near sun markham offices (9 exposures).

nikon 801s, f100, f4. fuji velvia @ iso 40 and provia 100.
various nikon lenses eg. micro nikkor 70-180 f/4.5-5.6 AF-D, nikkor 28-105 f/3.5-4.5 AF-D.

interesting reviews

recent valuable book reviews. [i have the first two; wolfram book is a large but curious mess, so i am keeping it for now. mayo's book is important, but not easy going for a neophyte in philosophy of science, so i am taking it slowly.]

cozma shalizi's review of a new kind of science by stephen wolfram.

As the saying goes, there is much here that is new and true, but what is true is not new, and what is new is not true; and some of it is even old and false, or at least utterly unsupported.

review of Error and the Growth of Experimental Knowledge by deborah g. mayo.

Experimental inquiry, for Mayo, consist of breaking down the question at hand into a series of small bits, each of which is relatively easily subjected to severe tests for error, or (depending on how you look at it) is itself a severe probe for a certain error.

[note: First Symposium on Philosophy, History, and Methodology of E.R.R.O.R [Experimental Reasoning, Reliability, Objectivity & Rationality: Induction, Statistics, & Modeling], Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, Virginia, June 1-5, 2006]

[chronological index of shalizi reviews. good stuff there.]

chris mooney's review of the politically incorrect guide to science

Indeed, in some sense Bethell's book provides a useful service. It offers, in one place, a nice catalogue of all the discredited arguments that are ritualistically used to undermine evolution, global warming, and much else that's well established in modern science.

[i did save a copy of the original cover image as appears in amazon, with its inadvertent claim/admission statement that is so revealing: liberals have hijacked science for long enough. now it's our turn]