David Gessel
Inspirational Books
New Scientist had a good article in the 10 April 08 issue about the formative books of the youth of 17 leading scientists. I found the most compelling Sean Carroll’s recommendation of One, Two, Three… Infinity.
It reminded me of a book that I remember reading in 4th grade that had a huge influence on my development: The Curve of Binding Energy.
I was already interested in nuclear physics and was motivated to read it. I think the book either inspired or reinforced many things that have become central parts of me; in particular an appreciation that understanding how things actually work gives one the ability to manipulate reality in a way that people who are less aware of how things work expect. Understanding things is lifetime power and (ever more importantly as I get older) a source of amusement. It illustrated how much fun being able to solve problems could be; the subversive (not merely empirical) value of knowledge.
I also learned how to make a mediocre nuclear weapon. Something that has made me a bit of smart ass ever since: if you know how to make the most fearsome weapon on earth it’s hard to be too intimidated. I wrote a paper in 9th grade describing how to build a weapon based on what I remembered from the book. About that time a student at Princeton got a lot of press for making a model nuclear bomb but using toothpaste instead of U-235, coincidently reinforcing my sense of significance.
After high school and after working as a programmer at a health physics company for a summer (and spending some formative time at a nuclear physics lab at U-Penn in grade school) I was one of a small number of nuclear engineering students on the fusion track at MIT. The Curve of Binding Energy inspired a love and appreciation of Nuclear Physics (and a sense of knowing something special) that only an act of congress could crush. When I was a freshman congress canceled funding for TARA, the tandem mirror experiment at MIT that about half the grad students I had just met were working on. While I dropped my FORTRAN efforts in support of FULIB and turned to robotics and eventually computers, I still ended up getting a degree in physics, course 8, not too far in practice or theory from course 20. And in no small part thanks to John McPhee and Ted Taylor.
Ghost Highway
This is a really cool post about some vestiges of a highway that was almost built through Boston and Cambridge. When I was in school I heard a rumor of this 695 project and that MIT, for obvious reasons opposed to having a freeway run through the middle of campus, did a few things along the way to deter construction:
- Building 20 was declared a national historic landmark (where radar was invented during world war II) though it was originally intended as a temporary structure and in the time it took MIT to undo that declaration it became increasingly rickety. It is now the site of the new Stata center.
- Parking structures (W45) were built along the path (it was said for the difficulty in demolishing them, thought that makes less sense now than it did as an undergrad)
- The MIT nuclear reactor was built right in the path. My favorite lab experiment ever was testing neutron wave/particle duality in 8.13
- A couple of fusion reactors were built along the same path, though these came later I think. I remember that test firings, especially of the tandem mirror confinement, caused some cool effects even in the control rooms.
Rental Review Impala LT
Rental car review. Impala 21:13:39 flex fuel with 37km on the odometer.
- Quiet – Not too bad. The interior is pretty soft so it’s fairly quiet, though very noisy on rough roads.
- Comfortable – Not bad, not as ass fondling as the Volvo…
- Basic amenities – Power everything, but no outside temperature reading. I like knowing the outside temp.
- Stereo – basic and acceptable. This one had a little plug in port for a MP3 player.
- Security – the trunk is big and secure.
GO Air Canada!
SAME SEATS! Different plane. That was a new one: we got aboot 100 meters down the runway and slammed on the breaks. The check engine light had come on. So, back to the gate, new plane, same seats…. Try, try again.
Air Canada
One good thing about air Canada, they’ve figured out what to put in a seat back: AC power, USB power, and an in-flight entertainment system with good movies! Who doesn’t love Canadian movies?
Rental Review Buick Allure CX
Rental car review
- Quiet – It is pretty quiet
- Comfortable – Not terribly comfortable. I don’t like squishy seats, but I suppose for some people it is..
- Basic amenities – Power everything, but no outside temperature reading. I like knowing the outside temp.
- Stereo – surprisingly mediocre for a fancy-ish car. The sound isn’t great and the radio has trouble getting marginal stations. Plus the radio display doesn’t tell you what station you’re listening too, which is helpful in a rental car.
- Security – the trunk is big and secure.
FEA for DVR
Some pretty FEA output for DVR’s Parkfield project.
why prosecution of polygamy is wrong
The Toronto Globe and Mail published an editorial by Tom Flanagan titled “The biological and philosophical reasons why we should prosecute polygamy” in which Mr. Flanagan laid out arguments in defense of the prosecution of the Eldorado Mormons and in defense of laws against polygamy, though his arguments are only valid against polygyny.
Mr. Flanagan’s arguments against the Eldorado sect follow a very uncontroversial line: that the wives are held either in fact or in effect against their will by strong social pressure, managed education, and arranged marriage which is also implied to be against their will. They are “treated as breeding machines,” he says.
These arguments apply equally to any coerced relationship, whether monogamous, polygynous, or polyandrous. Coercive monogamous relationships vastly outnumber coercive relationships of any other form; the few coercive polygamous relationships that come to light merit comment only out of prurience.
Mr. Flanagan goes on to posit an argument against polygamy on the basis of biology and philosophy that is so hypocritical that it seems more plausibly a straw man defense of polygamy.
Humans, he says, are biologically predisposed to polygyny on the basis of sexual dimorphism and as evidenced by the bulk of history; conversely, he fails to note adaptations for polyandry such as the coronal ridge, sperm viscosity, and noradrenaline.
The argument is that this predisposition to polygamy would, left unchecked by social edict, tend to accrete breeding females around a small number of alpha males, leaving the majority of beta males mateless, thus shiftless, and therefore more inclined toward crime and violence. And so, to protect society, we must assign women to a single male, even a beta male, lest she by following her animal urges plunge society into chaos.
It is not clear why this model does not, in fact, treat women as chattel and “breeding machines” whose distribution to desperate men is mandated by social pressure and force of law.
This argument is false. There is no evidence that women’s rights are protected by enforced monogamy, nor that civilization is threatened by polygamy: monogamy arose as a property right and polygyny was the norm at the founding of civilization.
While society has an obligation to intercede on behalf of the coerced, government has no place interfering in the private behavior of consenting adults.