New Minor League Baseball Stolen Base Record

Billy Hamilton has set a new professional baseball record for most stolen bases in a season. He now has 147 steals this year. The old record was Vince Coleman's 145 steals from 1983, and the Major League record is Rickey Henderson's 130 steals from 1982. Professional baseball players don't steal as many bases as they used to---the game is much more power-oriented than it was in the early 1980s---so this is even more impressive in the context of how the game is currently played.

Blog About Women Scientists from History

Here is a new blog about contributions of women scientists from history.

This is a really excellent idea, and I hope it leads to the contributions of these women becoming better known! I'm not a huge fan of the blog's title ("Science Chicks from History"), but I can appreciate the author making her own choice for her blog's tone. She writes the following about her new blog:

I’m just a nerdy science chick who decided to make a blog dedicated to women scientists from history. I wanted to learn more about these women and show that despite being excluded from science throughout much of history, many women still made important contributions to science.

Well done!

(Tip of the cap to Jaideep Singh.)

Eye Orientation of Ghosts in Pac-Man Games

Another of those things that perhaps says a lot about me: I saw a guy wearing a t-shirt with the ghost Shadow/Blinky from the Pac-Man series. And besides thinking that the shirt is awesome, do you know what else I noticed? That the ghost's eyes were oriented in the way that allows you to go through it without dying (which, by the way, is a skill ones needs to get really good at these games).

One of these years, I hope that I will get to the kill screen in Ms. Pac-Man...

Thought of the Day

You know what would be awesome? When a plenary speaker at a conference is going up to the podium to give his/her talk, there really needs to be loud, blaring music playing in the background to help introduce the speaker and pump up the audience! It works in wrestling and, damnit, it would also work in science! This totally needs to happen! Who's with me?

(And each person could have his/her own theme song, of course!)

Unfortunate Town Names

Great Britain seems to have several unfortunate town names. This includes the hamlet of Shitterton, which is located near Dorset in the Piddle Valley (which is, of course, near the River Piddle). No, I am not making this up. Crazy Brits! (Maybe I should go visit Golden Balls, which is near Oxford.)

On another note: Hmmm... That appears to be 10 blog entries in the past two days. Sometimes that is what happens when I spent too much time in front of my computer. I suppose I can try to be silent for a while, but a lot of interesting things have come my way lately. What can I do?

(Tip of the cap to Bernie Hogan.)

Putting The Simpsons Into LaTeX

Yup, that's right: You can actually put characters from The Simpsons into a LaTeX document. I am so going to do this in one of my publications!

Hell, if you look at Table 305 of this document, a skull-and-crossbones is available too. (Maybe I'll use that for the exponent the next time I report a power law?) The magical staves are pretty cool, too.

I hadn't known about this stuff before. It was a very dangerous thing to let me know this information...

(Tip of the cap to Puck Rombach.)

Software Package 'R' Makes the New York Times

The statistical software package called 'R' has made the New York Times. Some of my students have used R before, but mostly I just think it's cool that a venue like the New York Times would have an article on this topic. (Note that the article is from 2009, which I managed not to realize at first.)

(Tip of the cap to Jimmy Lin.)

The "Nostalgia Travel" Bus

Maybe this says more about me than about anything else, but I was highly amused to see a "Nostalgia Travel" double-decker bus with a driver but no passengers.

I love metaphors (even sad ones). That scene could have been the opening scene of a movie.

Alas, I didn't have my camera with me.

"We're NASA And We Know It"

If you haven't yet watched this parody of this song, you really should because it's pretty funny. On a more serious note, this kind of thing is really good for conveying the excitement of science to the public, and I would very much like to see more stuff like this.

(Tip of the cap to several people.)

Bulwer-Lyton "Winners": 2012 Edition

Here are the winners of the 2012 Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest. Some of the entries are brilliant, and some of them are just plain bad. I actually liked a few of the dishonorable mentions.

(Tip of the cap to Puck Rombach.)

New to the Blogroll: Quantum Frontiers

I have just added Quantum Frontiers to my blogroll. This blog is maintained by Caltech's Institute for Quantum Information and Matter, which includes many of my peeps from Caltech's condensed matter physics group (where I spent a couple of years as a CPI postdoc housed in in the theoretical subgroup right before coming to Oxford).

Graduate School Versus Kindergarten

Yup, PhD Comics has got it right on the money: graduate school is just like kindergarten. Scary, isn't it?

(Tip of the cap to 'I Fucking Love Science'.)

Scientists Train Chimps to Conduct Studies on Primates and to Apply for Grants

Yes, really. It's true. It was just reported in The Onion, so it must be true.

Comment: Wow. Just wow. (When The Onion gets something right, they really get it right! They completely nailed this one. This captures scientific life right on the money.)

"Bloody Fire Alarm Interrupted Me Mid-Sentence!"

The bloody fire alarm in my building just interrupted me mid-sentence!

(Does anybody else have a knee-jerk reaction of indignation to such things or do most people start by wondering what's going on? I'm just wondering...)

Félix Hernández Has Pitched a Perfect Game!

Félix Hernández (aka, "King Felix") of the Seattle Mariners has pitched the 23rd perfect game in Major League Baseball history. Very nice!

Movie Networks

Yes, really. Here are visualizations of social networks from movies.

(Tip of the cap to Brian Keegan.)

Water Bear

The "water bear" depicted on this page looks epically awesome, doesn't it? (It looks like an alien out of a science fiction novel or possibly a creature out of a Monster Manual.) Apparently, they are virtually indestructible.

(Tip of the cap to whoever does the Facebook posts for "I Fucking Love Science".)

He Got it From Whom?

"I Got It From Agnes" is an awesome Tom Lehrer song --- really, is there any other kind? --- complete with a growing network to illustrate what is going on.

This is a different recording of the song than the one I own, but the copy I have on iTunes doesn't have a network diagram to go with it (and that does add to the humor substantially).

(Tip of the cap to Edmund Chattoe-Brown and Stan Wasserman.)

Political Cartoons from Union of Concerned Scientists

Several of these cartoons regarding science and its interaction with policy, media, and other things are funny, but they also paint a very depressing picture of the state of things.

Sign of the Day

I just walked out of Dartington House and some random student walked up to me holding a sign that read "Will Work for Mathematica Advice".

Unfortunately, I didn't have my camera with me (and it wouldn't be very inconspicuous for me to come back with a camera in hand). I just wrote a post about this on Facebook and hope that somebody still in Dartington House takes a picture of this before it's too late.

Where is Stephen Wolfram when you need him?

(By the way, I told him: "Sorry. I don't use Mathematica.")

How Research Projects End

Research projects only ever end for one or both of two reasons: (1) you run out of time, and/or (2) you get bored and move on.

They're never truly finished in their entirety, and anybody who tells you otherwise is full of crap.

Update: Jaideep Singh points out that "run out of funding" is a third distinct possibility. (However, as I am a mathematician and thus have very little funding anyway, I am generally able to avoid the third option entirely.)

Unbaby.me

I just found out about the Unbaby.me website, which allows one to replace baby pictures in Facebook feeds with pictures of awesome stuff. This is tempting. Very, very tempting.

(Tip of the cap to the New York Times.)

Exactly.

Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal is right on the money in this set of panels of how discoveries occur.

New Networks Journal!

The Journal of Complex Networks has now officially been approved by Oxford University Press. I am one of the Associate Editors (and I think I am the only person actually from University of Oxford who is on the editorial board). I just got the word that I should spread the word... So I am spreading it. :)

More details coming soon...

Could You Clarify That a Bit?

The Annals of Improbable Research blog has a brief discussion of an upcoming journal article about the virtues of vagueness in vision statements. Choice line from the journal article: "We also explore the paradox that, occasionally, the path out of ambiguity involves the initial injection of even more ambiguity into an already ambiguous situation."

Wow.

One of the All-Time Classics: "His Theory is Retarded."

One of the all-time classic seminar audience-member comments when talking about the speaker: "His theory is retarded."

This works, best, by the way when the speaker is a job candidate. :)

Two Tricks Are Better Than One

John Preskill has written a blog entry about how being a two-trick pony versus being just a one-trick pony can make all the difference in the world when it comes to scientific contributions.

I keep wanting to learn more and more tricks primarily to prevent my own boredom, but John is absolutely right about how important it is to know at least two scientific tricks.

"Bloody Minded"

Yesterday, Somerville's Principal told me that I am "bloody minded". I've decided to take this as a compliment.

(As far as I can tell, this is the British term for "pain in the ass".)

Olympic Gymnast Uses Music From Zelda

OK, this is awesome! Olympic gymnast Elsa Garcia Rodriguez Blancas of Mexico used a medley of Zelda during her Olympic performance. Now that rocks! [And, as the article discusses, this isn't the first time she's done that. That's my kind of woman. :) ] This is just awesome beyond belief!

(Tip of the cap to Louis Wang.)

The Science of Sandcastles

An article was published in Scientific Reports today about constructing 'perfect' sandcastles. That's a pretty cool topic on which to write an article! I think that the authors might have Ig Nobel Prizes in their future...

(Tip of the cap to Sang Hoon Lee.)

New Postdoc Position in my Lab

Hot off the presses is an advertisement to become a postdoc in my lab to study multiplex networks. This is a 34-month (aka, almost 3-year) position.

Lots of information is available on the website above.

Note (8/03/12): I have temporarily taken down the advertisement because of some confusion. I will put this back up as soon as the confusion gets resolved. The deadline for when to apply might get pushed back a bit, but I don't know yet about that. Sigh.

Where Have You Gone, Stubby Clapp?

There are some pretty damn good names in the Minor Leagues, but none of them are as cool as Stubby Clapp or (especially) Razor Shines.

Dodgers Acquire Shane Victorino

It looks like the deal for Shane Victorino is now official. This improves the Dodgers outfield, though this deal is obviously far less exciting than the deal for Hanley Ramirez. (Also, Victorino doesn't seem to be the player that he used to be, though this does improve our lineup a bit more.) He actually started out in the Dodger organization.

The article to which I linked above summarizes the other Dodger moves. For example, yesterday we acquired reliever Brandon League from the Mariners. Apparently, Ryan Dempster might well join us soon as well (though Dempster's recent shenanigans regarding purported trades to the Dodgers and then to the Braves were pretty obnoxious).

"Theoretical Mathematics" > "Pure Mathematics"

I am going to rant briefly. :)

The term "pure mathematics" is incredibly obnoxious. It is highly charged, as it suggests a superiority over applied mathematics with which I (and many others) beg to differ. Of course, it is better than the term "unadulterated mathematics" that I once saw on a blog, but that isn't exactly a difficult lower bound to surpass.

A far better---not only less charged but also considerably more accurate---substitute for the term "pure" mathematics is theoretical mathematics. This would also be consistent with other fields: Nobody in their right mind would use the terms "pure chemistry", "pure physics", "pure biology", "pure computer science", etc. This terminological denigration of other areas of a discipline seems to be the exclusive domain of mathematics. (Please let me know of any other examples if you're aware of them.)

There are relevant differences to note. For example, physics that is not "applied physics" is still done in the laboratory. But from the perspective of what research is done and the goals thereof, the term "theoretical mathematics" is rather consistent with similar terminology in other fields. The term "pure" mathematics needs to go.

My Old Ping Pong Coach

There is a small chance that I'll be able to get tickets for Olympic ping pong, which is the only sport that I care about in the Olympics. I decided to e-mail my old ping pong coach (Olympian Wei Wang) to see if she has any opinion about which countries have the most exciting players to watch. It would be really cool to go see some Olympic ping pong in person.

Epiphany on the Use of Time Machines

You know, it occurs to me that if I had a time machine, the main thing for which I would want to use it would be so that I wouldn't have to wait for anybody to respond to my messages.

Because I'm such a patient person. :) [In fact, my patience is legendary.]

If you think about it, this should not surprise anybody who knows me.

Why Not?

Go to the Matlab command line and type 'why'. Then do it several more times. (For bonus points, find a clever way to use this command as part of a loop or some other series of commands.) I wonder how long this Easter Egg has existed? I only just found out about it today. Maybe I'm easily amused, but (a) I think this is awesome and (b) there must be some clever thing that one can do with this. :)

(Tip of the cap to whoever posts things for Matlab on Facebook.)

2012 Summer Olympics: Epic Mascot Fail

I hadn't been paying attention to the Olympics --- because, really, who the fuck cares about that nonsense (except for ping pong, of course) --- but this article (posted by Alexander Morisse on Facebook) shows a picture of one of the twin Olympic mascots. And I'll be damned: it looks like a cartoony CCTV camera. That's actually rather apt for this country, especially since I can't even fathom what a large cartoony queue would look like. But really, England? You actually want to brag about the fact that you invade people's privacy beyond belief? Sheesh...

(That said, it would be nigh impossible to sink beneath the official mascot low point that Atlanta gave the world for the 1996 Summer Olympic Games. But London certainly has done it's best to try, hasn't it?)

Statistics? We Don't Need No Stinkin' Statistics!

The paper described in this blog entry is "awesome". Indeed, it has the best 'Results' section ever.

The 'Results' section in the original published version of the paper started out with the following sentence: In this study, we have used (insert statistical method here) to compile unique DNA methylation signatures from normal human heart, lung, and kidney using the Illumina Infinium 27 K methylations arraysand [sic] compared those to gene expression by RNA sequencing.

D'oh!

(Tip of the cap to Krešo Josić.)

Dodgers Trade for Hanley Ramirez!

The Dodgers have acquired Hanley Ramirez from the Marlins! That is awesome!

RIP Sherman Hemsley (1938-2012)

Sherman Hemsley, best known for playing the memorable George Jefferson, has died. I watched Hemsley on the show Amen as well.

New to the Blogroll: Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal

I just added Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal to the blogroll. I know, I know: I should have done this a long time ago.

1982 Study by Institute for the Future

Wow, this 1982 study by Institute for the Future is almost dead-on correct. Just wow.

They did get the bit about the N-party system wrong, however.

(Tip of the cap to Jimmy Lin.)

Art Class: 2012 Edition

I am taking an art class, just like I did last fall. I have posted pictures from today's class, which was the first of 5 classes. You can find these pictures and also those from last year in this album.

The teacher for this class is Josie Lyons, who also taught the course I took last fall. This year, we are doing portraiture. More importantly, we are using a different medium each week, and a major part of the point is to learn how to use different media. Today was pencil.

I See That My Work is Done Here.

I just got a nice e-mail from one of my (British) former undergrads. (I really like hearing from my former students!) Part of his e-mail reads as follows: My current housemate is a massive baseball fan from California. He's a Giants fan and he's really got me into baseball. Though the Giants are having such an awesome season, I can't help but side with the Dodgers, and that's your fault.

I see that my work is done here. :)

Why Science? (Revisiting My Essay From a Decade Ago)

When I was in graduate school (over a decade ago), I wrote an essay about becoming a scientist that was published in Beverly Hills Weekly. (I also posted a slightly modified version on my website.)

I just reread both of these documents. And, damn, I still agree with almost everything I wrote over a decade ago! I surprise myself sometimes. :) It also goes to show that---for all of my supposed cynicism---I still am an extremely idealistic person. I will do my best to stay that way!

The Sounds of Science

If you listen carefully, you might be able to hear the sound of me producing new knowledge.

It is vaguely reminiscent of a car trying to start (but with a bit more swearing).

Vintage Mason

I was standing outside of Jericho Cafe (and not moving) when someone rammed into me. It was an old woman, and she was glaring at me as if it was my fault. It was her fault, so I glared back at her. This kept up for a bit before I and those with me started walking south. And then I explained (with utter indignation) to the others what had happened:

She bumped into me! It was her fault, and I am not going to apologize just because she's old!

To which Sandra González-Bailón responded using her best deadpan: Mason, you're making friends again.

(This is vintage Mason, by the way.)

Take That, Physicists!

This edition of Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal is simply beautiful.

(Tip of the cap to Greg Fricke.)

A Toast to Poincaré!

Henri Poincaré died 100 years ago today. (Poincaré is the founding father of my field.)

(Tip of the cap to Physics Today.)

One of My Contributions to Physics

The quote "Cycles. Is there anything they can’t do?" certainly sounds like something that I would say or write sarcastically, though I no longer remember when I said (or wrote) this. Anyway, you can find it at the top of Chapter 13 of Chaos: Classical and Quantum.

New Rule

New rule: You are not allowed to sing along to "Roxanne" at the local ice cream place unless you also act out the relevant scene from "Moulin Rouge".

(I think I am now deaf from the decibel level I needed from my iPod.)

SETI Rickroll

I wholeheartedly approve of this Abstruse Goose comic!

(Tip of the cap to I Fucking Love Science.)

Caltech NCAA Demotivational Poster

Here is my first attempt at a demotivational poster in "recognition" of Caltech's NCAA rules violation.

(Thanks to Greg Fricke, Janet Sheung, and Michael Woods for inspiration.)

Update: Here is a slightly revised version that I like better.

Update (7/15/12): Predrag Cvitanovic has alerted me to a New York Times article on Caltech's sanctions. That article notes that no ineligible players were used in the streak-breaking basketball game. Hence, this demotivational poster is misleading. I might have to come up with a different take on this whole thing. :)

Update (7/17/12): Nimish Telang has alerted me to this opinion piece in the New York Times (which, by the way, gets it exactly right).

How to Win An Argument

Between starting my line of argument with "So it has come to this." and ending by claiming victory with "Wheeeeeee!", I think that am just about guaranteed victory in my verbal fights from now on!

Tales from the ArXiv: Synchronization of Douchebags

Well, technically the paper is called Geometry of Deadbeat Synchronization.

The abstract is as follows: Deadbeat synchronization of identical discrete-time nonlinear systems is studied from a geometric point of view. An array of deadbeat observers coupled via a deadbeat interconnection is shown to achieve synchronization in finite number of steps provided that a compatibility condition is satisfied between the observer and the interconnection. As an illustration to the theory, an example is provided where an array of third order observers achieves deadbeat synchronization.

My favorite phrase in this paper is that a sentence starts with "An array of deadbeat observers". How awesome is that! (The term doesn't mean what the author thinks it means...)

Note: I will resist the large temptation to make fun of certain parts of the United States. :)

Caltech Sanctioned for Athletic Violation!

Yes, really. Caltech has been sanctioned by the NCAA for athletic violations.

This is like the start of a comic routine.

(Tip of the cap to Michael Woods and Yan Zhang.)

Update: This article from The Washington Post starts off the article rather snarkily, and rightfully so. We are so going to be the butt of jokes for this. (Thanks to Rachel Gray for posting this article.)

Update (7/15/12): Deb Eason has posted a link to an LA Times opinion piece by Bill Plaschke. In fact, this whole slew of stories has actually been really good for Caltech's publicity. Caltech turned itself in, which was absolutely the right thing to do. In so doing, Caltech is showing other schools how things should be done.

Two-Minute Thesis Contest

PhD Comics is holding a contest that invites people to describe their PhD thesis work in 2 minutes. Jorge Cham of PhD Comics might even select to broadcast your audio file on the PhD Comics site.

Come on! You know you want to!

(Tip of the cap to Jimmy Lin.)

Creativity, Not Raw Intelligence!

Over the years, I have seen a lot of conversations about how smart certain people are. These conversations have been frequent throughout my education and career, and there seems to somehow be a conflating between raw intelligence (whatever that is) and success.

To be sure, some of my colleagues at the various universities where I have spent time are absolutely brilliant people. One can often tell which of them just tower above everybody else in terms of raw intelligence. Good for them. This helps a lot when taking timed exams, but as long as one is able to achieve some minimum threshold of technical skills (which one needs to get through ordeals like graduate school), then one's success as a scientist then has much more to do with other things---like luck and creativity.

The most successful scientists tend to be the most creative ones (and there has to be some luck as well). They may or may not be the ones with the most raw intelligence. That is a myth---and a very damaging one at that. I know which faculty members I have met are geniuses or something along those lines, but my rankings of colleagues by raw intelligence versus by success are completely different. Raw intelligence does not (by any stretch of the imagination) make one's scholarship better than anyone else's. So let's do away with the myth that technical prowess is the key ingredient to success, ok? It is creativity, which is much harder to still but can (I believe) be developed.

On a similar note, hard is not the same thing as good. The problem one is studying doesn't have to be "hard". If you find an easy --- and, FSM forbid, understandable --- approach that turns out to be insightful, then (as one of my mentors taught me) that is in fact even better than doing something technically hard and achieving exactly the same insights!

Science is not about who does something that is technically the hardest. It is about insight, and that makes creativity both king and queen.

Damn! They Found My Super Secret Spy Name!

I just received a spam e-mail that starts in a very amusing way:

‎"Dear Dr. Not Found,

We would like to have an opportunity to work with you and develop monoclonal antibody libraries for your next target protein."

[The message is considerably longer, but I hope I have gotten the point across. :) ]

My Kind of Sign

This is my kind of sign. I approve! :)

Catalog Graphics

For the next couple of years, the front and back covers of the book catalog from the Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics will be featuring graphics from my research (created using visualization tools that we developed in-house).

Only look at the front and back pages of the linked file. I doubt many of you will want to go through the whole file. :)

Applied Mathematics and Statistics are Not the Same!

Applied mathematics is not statistics. And vice versa.

Personally, I think this is an obvious statement, but at least one prominent sexy journal (Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences) does not get it, and in my opinion this leads to a rather unfair bias against applied mathematics in this journal. Take a look at PNAS's editorial board, and in particular take a look at the three scholars listed under the category "Applied Mathematical Sciences". All three of them --- Peter Bickel, David Donoho, and Stephen Fienberg --- are card-carrying statisticians.

This is a major inequity. (I think it's also a major problem, but instead of arguing that per se, let me instead argue the lesser claim that it's a major inequity.) For example, applied mathematicians and statisticians have completely different notions of the word "model". To a typical applied mathematician, modelling constitutes the development of dynamical and/or generative models. A model might be a set of coupled differential equations that is derived using momentum balances and constitutive laws, it might be a phenomenological set of differential or difference equations that attempts to describe some qualitative features in a biological system, it might be a set of rules for generating an ensemble of random graphs, etc. Wikipedia has a long discussion of what constitutes a mathematical model, and many of these are the "dynamical models" that have long been favored by applied mathematicians. A statistical model, however, is something completely different. The phrasing in Wikipedia states that a statistical model "describes how one or more random variables are related to one or more random variables." Clearly, the Navier Stokes equations do not constitute a statistical model; but they are a mathematical model.

So why am I ranting about the inequity at PNAS? Well, if I try to get a paper in their applied mathematics section, I am going to have to get my paper through a statistician. And I have had a paper desk-rejected because the formulation contained in my paper did not constitute a statistical model. And that's true---it didn't. But I submitted an applied mathematics paper---not a statistics paper---and therefore I want to have it judged by card-carrying applied mathematicians. PNAS purports to represent applied mathematics, but it doesn't. There needs to be truth in advertising. They need to either claim that applied mathematics isn't part of their purview (which, by the way, I do not think is the right solution), or their list of editors in "Applied Mathematical Sciences" must include at least one actual applied mathematician!

Note: There is some overlap between models in applied mathematics and statistics when it comes to ensembles of random graphs, but even then applied mathematicians and statisticians tend to look at these beasts in different ways.

Fun Fact about OCD

Fun Fact: I chose the name for my research group because it allows me to use the acronym "OCD" for my group. Yes, that is the actual reason.

Precedent (and partial inspiration): The University of Maryland's "Chaos Group" includes a lot of research on nonlinear systems, complex systems, and networks. Just like me.

Congratulations to Dr. Tim Elling!

I am delighted to report that Dr. Tim Elling has just successfully defended his Ph.D. thesis in Applied and Computational Mathematics at Caltech. His thesis is called GPU accelerated Fourier-continuation solvers and physically exact computational boundary conditions for wave scattering problems, and it was supervised by Oscar Bruno.

I actually looked through the thesis for a bit and saw Tim give a practice talk. There is some pretty cool stuff in there. But one gap does remain: What about random cracks? :)

Grumpy!

You know how a lot of people have .signatures when sending e-mail from certain devices along the lines of 'Forgive the short message. Sent from my [item].'?

I need to start including a message, 'Forgive my grumpiness. I am in a foul mood.' to my e-mails, and I also need to be able to call this up at a moment's notice.

[Actually, what really need to do is to not respond until tomorrow before I write something I regret. :) I also need to make sure I am awake for 2am, though.]

I had a red-eye flight last night and the bloody customs officer this morning gave me all sorts of shit when I tried to enter the UK this morning. I was asked the same question multiple times by multiple people --- I think some questions were asked as many as 4 times --- and I then had an extra-special security check (which was thankfully short). Man does this endear me to this country... (I felt so fed up that thoughts of buying a plane ticket back to the US and boarding such a flight asap flitted briefly through my head.)

Update: Or to paraphrase my comment from lunch today, I am the "public relations" specialist at Somerville. (And if you don't understand this quote, then I need to educate you about a certain tv program! My colleagues were amused by my comment, though I don't think they appreciated the full power of the reference.)

Putin on the Ritz

I thoroughly approve of this demotivational poster.

D & D Monster Manual: Baseball Pitcher Edition

Here is a pretty clever article that discusses some Major League Baseball pitchers using the format of D & D Monster Manual entries. Overall, I think the idea was much better than the implementation, but there are a few bits that are fantastic. (See, in particular, the entry for Jamie Moyer.)

(Tip of the cap to Justin.)

What Happens in Orlando Stays in Orlando

Tomorrow afternoon, I will be flying to Orlando to take part in a conference on differential equations and dynamical systems. I went to the 2000 iteration of this conference but this is my first one since then. It is a math conference with both pure and applied parts of those two areas represented. Orlando is going to be 95 degrees and humid the entire time I am there, so I'll basically just stay indoors and blast the air con. (Scheduling a conference for Florida for the first week of July is a rather strange choice.)

A couple of Techers from my era (including one of my CS 1 TAs!) are attending the conference, and I am going to hang out with a different Techer (Ben Williamson) who lives in Florida and who I haven't seen since 2007. Also, this is my first trip to Orlando since 2004.

Colorful Ants

Ants + Liquid + Food Coloring = Big Win!

(Tip of the cap to 'I Fucking Love Science'.)

Fortune Cookie of the Day

This evening, I got one of the best "fortunes" I have ever received: "You can always tell luck from ability by its duration [in bed]."

Network Topology versus Network Geometry

There is a terminological issue in the study of networks about which I need to rant.

Many people write about network topology, and this is good terminology when referring to connectivity alone. Ignore whether edges have any weights and just consider which ones are connected to which others (with either directed edges or undirected edges). Such terminology is a good extension of the mathematical notion of topology, which only cares about how things are connected to each other but doesn't care a whit about actually measuring distances. Things either are connected or they're not.

The problem is that numerous papers still use the word "topology" when they are talking about the weights of edges. That is a notion of distance, so using the word topology is in fact dead wrong. When one is describing edges weights and playing around with them, the term that people should be using is in fact network geometry, as the point of the mathematical notion of geometry is measuring distance.

So please, please, please distinguish between "network topology" and "network geometry" when you give talks, write papers, etc. Otherwise you are committing a rather egregious mathematical sin.

Star Trails over the Australian Outback

These pictures are absolutely gorgeous. Star trails for the win!

(Tip of the cap to 'I Fucking Love Science'.)

Classic Word of the Day: Psychoceramics

Today's word is one of the all-time classics:

Psychoceramicist [n]: someone who studies crackpottery. (And, of course, "psychoceramics" is a synonym for "crackpottery".)

(This word is based on longstanding discussions with Arcane Gazebo, who as far as I can tell is the inventor of the word. He doesn't practice psychoceramics, though. He's got a physics PhD and works in finance. Oh wait... :P)

Update: I have a Facebook comment from the Gazebo that reminds me about his blog post about psychoceramics, which explains how he found out about the word. I also have an e-mail from Cosma Shalizi with two websites that I assume either are or have the origins of the word contained therein. This one is an old blog post of his, and this one is an entire archive about pyschoceramics. So, no, the Gazebo did not invent the word. By the way, this brings back memories that the Gazebo used to (or maybe still does?) read Cosma's blog, which perhaps brings things back full circle?

Best. Shirts for Twin Babies. Ever.

The parents of these twin babies are awesome! I approve!

These Aren't the Books You're Looking For

No, really. I am serious about this.

Update (6/24/12): Investigator (and Caltech alum) Jimmy Lin has confirmed that this store does indeed exist. It is located in Hong Kong. I am so visiting that store when I go to Hong Kong. (I don't currently have a trip to Hong Kong planned, but it will happen eventually.)

Another Win for Google Doodle

Today's Google doodle celebrates the 100th anniversary of Alan Turing's birth. And this is one sweet Google doodle!

Truer Words Were Never Spoken

This particular strip from Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal gets it exactly right. Truer words were never spoken. The importance of the research that gets me excited me is simply because it's fucking awesome. There's really no other reason at all. If it ever truly helps with anything, so much the better. But that's not what I care about or why I do research and love science. I do it because it's fucking awesome!

(Tip of the cap to the people who post items for I Fucking Love Science on Facebook.)

New Olympic Events

I've posted way too much today, and I apologize for that. But dig, if you will, the picture: I am at the movies to see Rock of Ages. "Chariots of Fire" is playing on infinite repeat. And right in front of me is a couple making out. Somehow combining that with that particular Olympian song as the background just creates a bizarre scene.

I guess they were going for a gold medal!

Quote of the Day (Again)

Here is one of my e-mail utterances for today: "Thankfully I am good at pissing people off and bad at keeping track of money. My personality sometimes comes in handy."

Time-Dependent Properties of the Hair of Physicists

Physicists have established a fine tradition when it comes to hair, and I have made it an important part of my life to continue this tradition.

(Tip of the cap to Physics Today.)

Tales from the ArXiv: "Dangling Nodes"

This new paper discusses the distribution of "dangling nodes". Yes, that's right! The term "dangling nodes" is now in the literature!

Of course, I think that there might be a big difference between a dangling-node distribution and a dangling node-distribution.

Lego Turing Machine

Yes, that's right: someone has endeavored to build a Turing machine out of Lego. Pretty cool, huh?

(Tip of the cap to Krešo Josić.)

Groan...

This plot is extremely depressing.

However, I also noticed something else: Many countries are missing, so my scientific eye automatically makes me wonder whether the data was cherry-picked. How were countries selected to be chosen for the statistical fit? It doesn't change how depressing this plot is, but cherry-picking data really irks me too. (Maybe only these countries were surveyed, but I find that hard to believe.)

(Tip of the cap to Frances Schaeffer.)

What about "A Number Of"?

Today's xkcd touches on a topic that is all too familiar.

Just. One. More. Turn.

Somebody played Civ II for 10 years and has ended up with quite an apocalyptic world.

(Tip of the cap to Josie Messa, who mentioned this at tonight's math leavers party, as well as whoever does the Facebook posts for Civilization.)

RIP Elinor Ostrom (1933-2012)

Elinor Ostrom, the only Nobel Laureate to be produced by my high school (Beverly Hills High School), has died of pancreatic cancer.

(Tip of the cap to James Fowler.)

RIP Warner Fusselle (1944-2012)

Warner Fuselle, announcer for the Brooklyn Cyclones and former fill-in for Mel Allen in This Week in Baseball, has died.

One of the reasons I am writing this blog entry is to point out the back-handed nature of the ESPN article, which highlights the fact that he was a fill-in. To be fair, that is why I know he is --- and presumably others are most likely to recognize him for this reason --- but it's still rather strange.

Headline: Oxford's IT Learning Programme Seeks to "Create More Pleasurable 'User Experiences' "

Let me quote directly from the beginning of an e-mail from Oxford's IT Learning Programme that advertises one of their upcoming courses:

"The need to (...) create more pleasurable 'user experiences' when designing technology has become increasingly apparent in recent years."

What on earth are they teaching at this university???

License Plate of the Day

The license plate in this demotivational poster is fantastic (especially when in the context of the particle vehicle it's on).

And, as a special bonus, here is another demotivational poster that I really like.

"Differential Recruitment of the Sensorimotor Putamen and Frontoparietal Cortex During Motor Chunking in Humans"

A new article of mine just came out. This is my second article on neuroscience, and there are plenty more where it came from! (I've been having a lot of fun working on projects in neuroscience, so I intend to continue doing a lot of work in this area.) This journal (Neuron) apparently doesn't have page proofs, which I did not realize. I usually do a final OCD pass on article text once page proofs are available, so I'll need to keep that in mind the next time I submit to this journal. Anyway, here is some information about the article. (And, by the way, there is absolutely no truth to the rumor that I convinced my coauthors to let me bring up Guitar Hero explicitly in the abstract. I purposely start my explanations of this project by bringing up Guitar Hero...)

Title: Differential Recruitment of the Sensorimotor Putamen and Frontoparietal Cortex During Motor Chunking in Humans

Authors: Nicholas F. Wymbs,Danielle S. Bassett, Peter J. Mucha, Mason A. Porter, and Scott T. Grafton

Abstract (which contains neither the word 'guitar' nor the word 'hero'): Motor chunking facilitates movement production by combining motor elements into integrated units of behavior. Previous research suggests that chunking involves two processes: concatenation, aimed at the formation of motor-motor associations between elements or sets of elements, and segmentation, aimed at the parsing of multiple contiguous elements into shorter action sets. We used fMRI to measure the trial-wise recruitment of brain regions associated with these chunking processes as healthy subjects performed a cued-sequence production task. A dynamic network analysis identified chunking structure for a set of motor sequences acquired during fMRI and collected over 3 days of training. Activity in the bilateral sensorimotor putamen positively correlated with chunk concatenation, whereas a left-hemisphere frontoparietal network was correlated with chunk segmentation. Across subjects, there was an aggregate increase in chunk strength (concatenation) with training, suggesting that subcortical circuits play a direct role in the creation of fluid transitions across chunks.

The Importance of Being Anal

Collaborations are a form of marriage. They last differing amounts of time and can fail for all sorts of reasons.

I am a very anal person---absolutely through-the-roof anal---and one of the things about which I care very deeply is exposition. In my publications, I want to get my wording precisely right if at all possible, even though I will invariably change my mind about some things when looking back later after my memory of why I wanted a particular phrasing has faded away. (My writing goals for this blog are rather different, as you have probably noticed. Here my goal is to write in a stream-of-consciousness form whose intent is for you to imagine me ranting at you---or perhaps even to imagine me discussing things calmly with you, which does actually happen on occasion.)

So, in short, I believe that not only are scientific calculations critically important but that one also must be ultra-anal (one might even call it "OCD") about writing things both for clarity and for style. One can certainly argue endlessly about style, but let's just say that I have a style, and we can forego discussions of whether or not you or anyone else think it's crap. (I hope that's ok.) And because of this, I am generally a major pain in the ass for people like journal editors---possibly frustrating interactions with me have caused at least one reputable journal to change their editorial policies (or so I believe)---and, of course, my coauthors. Hashing out phrasing when I am on the author list can be a somewhat trying experience, and it usually lasts longer when working with me than it does when working with others. So if you can't handle that, than you shouldn't work with me. The marriage just won't work.

Anyway, I believe very strongly that scholarly work depends not just on the raw scholarship but that my personal scholarship is enhanced substantially by my anal writing. (I will speculate that this particular attitude meshes much better with my arts and humanities colleagues than it does with my scientific ones.) I spent time as a journalist in college, as I put in 4 years as a writer and 1 year as a co-editor for a vaunted (snicker) publication known as The California Tech, and I cannot overstate how important that has been for my scientific career.

But back to things closer to the point: I am presently dealing with the revision of a paper (for which a journal editor and referees keep moving the bar, which is massively annoying). I know that I tend to frustrate many of my coauthors with my keen insistence on language, but because of the circumstances with this revision---and there are some additional complicating factors that I am not telling you---perhaps things have boiled over a bit, and one of my coauthors (indeed, a soon-to-be-former coauthor) dismissed as trivial what I consider to be very important grammatical, stylistic, and spelling corrections (which I made crystal clear that I considered to be very important things to do to improve the paper). And it's fine for my coauthor to think things are trivial even when I think they're important. I can handle that, and we're all entitled to different opinions. Collaboration---like all marriages---requires compromise. But I will simply not accept something I consider as critically important being dismissed as trivial rather than hashed out (or my being allowed to have control of the file so that I can make the damn changes myself). If I make it clear that I feel something is important, then my coauthor damn well better either work with me on it or let me spend the time to make the changes I want and then iterate with me as necessary until we both like things. So when this paper is over and we get our final acceptance from this journal or some other one, we'll part ways---not because my coauthor thinks my comments were trivial but rather because the fact that I obviously considered them important wasn't construed as a sufficient reason to hash them out anyway. In these situations---namely, when my collaborator finds that something is important, regardless of whether I find it important---I do make time even when it doesn't exist, and I expect the same of others. (And, very importantly, I obviously deserve my share of the blame for our parting of ways. I can be difficult to work with at times, and it would be improper for me to deny that.)

Alright, I have now ranted a lot. Such is my nature. Let me end on a more positive note and bring things full circle (or perhaps the orbit has a different shape?). What are the fruits of being anal? To give one example, I am really proud of the introduction to this recent paper. It discusses different types of assumptions that people make when deriving approximate theories to study dynamical systems on networks, and it carefully distinguishes various assumptions (which are often implicit in many papers rather than discussed explicitly, let alone carefully) that are made when developing certain types of theories. I have been writing some lecture notes on dynamical systems on networks in preparation for my book (on which I am woefully far behind, by the way), and I have drawn one short section from the relevant part of this paper's introduction. I have looked through many sources while preparing my lecture notes, and I can't find a single other one that presents these assumptions so clearly, and here we have them all in the same place in one coherent discussion. This paper is a technical paper on a rather specific topic and it appears in Physical Review E, which is a very good but decidedly non-sexy journal. So it's readership isn't going to be very broad or include overwhelming numbers of people. And the discussion in the introduction to this paper is not the kind of 'impact' (shudder!) that concerns the UK government, University of Oxford, and (I believe) most researchers from most disciplines. But my coauthors and I did the best job I have ever seen of explaining this particular set of material, which is confusing to many people and is typically explained poorly (if at all) in other works that discuss analytical approximations for dynamical systems on networks. Granted, my coauthors and I hashed out this exposition after nontrivial referee prompting, but that's a story for another day. It was certainly worth it, though! (Hence, mad props go out to the referees as well.)

So if you take anything at all from this blog entry, let it be one thing: it's really important for a scientist to be anal not only in calculations and other forms of 'raw scholarship' but also in their writing (down to the last comma).

The University Laundry Cycle

As XKCD illustrates quite nicely, it's a good thing that our term only lasts 8 weeks.

RIP Ray Bradbury (1920-2012)

Ray Bradbury died today. Here is his wikipedia page.

I really need to read Farenheit 451 at some point. I've intended to for years, but I have not yet managed to get around to it---this is especially true because my skype id is inspired by that title along with my own attempt at irony.

On this day, it is worth reading Ray Bradbury's awesome 2000 commencement speech at Caltech, which I had the pleasure to watch. On the topic of commencement speeches, which are rather seasonal nowadays, two other ones I got to witness are Bill Nye's 1998 speech at Caltech (that was the year I graduated) and Sandra Tsing Loh's 2005 speech at Caltech. Finally, let me also mention that one of my dynamical systems contemporaries D.J. Patil (who, alas, no longer studies dynamical systems and now works in industry) was given the incredible honor of giving this year's commencement speech at University of Maryland (whence he got his Ph.D. as a member of the infamous Chaos Group). I was unable to find Nye's speech quickly via Google, so please post a link in the comments if you're able to find one. (I really need to get back to work.)

(Tips of the cap for Jaideep Singh [who posted Bradbury's commence speech], Ryan Mack [whose post informed me more directly about Bradbury's death], and D.J. Patil [for posting a link to the text of his speech.)

The Legend Continues

Just now, I was looking through the new draft of a paper to be resubmitted that just arrived on my desk tonight. Annoyingly, I was finding tons of the same grammatical mistakes (rather egregious ones) that I pointed out in the last version and found that I was typing out many of the same suggestions.

I started to become really annoyed that almost none (or none) of my suggestions had been implemented, despite claims to the contrary. And then I noticed that I was accidentally going through the last version rather than the new one.

No wonder the same mistakes were still there!

(At least I'm consistent.)

Me as a Stick Figure

Here is what one of my students thinks I look like as a stick figure. Notice that the homework write-up is almost as large as my head.

Name a Symmetry for Charity!

Come on. Name a symmetry for charity! You know you want to!

Mine is called "Mason's Spectacular Narcisstic Group". Part of the inspiration for my name was the "extraspecial group", whose name would also be accompanied by giggling whenever my Math 5 prof mentioned it. [He also invariably giggled whenever he added "with 1" to "commutative ring".]

Exam Survival Skills

Grrr.... I know it's the same story every year and in every institution, but damnit some of my students still aren't bloody listening to me!

Is it really that hard to grasp the following exam survival skill: Write down the damn thing that you're calculating so that partially correct things are easy to find for someone who is grading 300 exams and is therefore going to be bored, exhausted, looking at things quickly, and not going to excavate things. (Floating vector identities are much easier to find if, for example, what you're actually trying to do is indicated in some sort of clear fashion!)

Giving that advice once makes sense, but stubbornness on that particularly point is just really damn stupid. (When you go into the forest, you don't annoy the bears; and when you're taking an exam, you don't annoy the graders.) I'm not giving such advice just for shits and giggles. Sigh...

Achievement Unlocked: Double-Digit Footnotes on Page 1

It is a little-known fact that the notation for the 10th footnote of a single page using the *, †, etc. convention is in fact "§§".

Yes, that's right, I actually got to the 10th footnote on p. 1 of a journal that uses that notation. If that doesn't deserve an "Achievement Unlocked!" when using this particular convention for footnotes, then I don't know what does.

It appears, however, that the journal in question (Quantitative Finance) seems to be using a nontraditional version of this typographic convention.

Powerful Photographs

Here are 40 powerful photographs. It's a bit too geared to recent things, but it is very much worth a look.

(Tip of the cap to Maria Satterwhite.)